Using Apple Cider Vinegar to Treat Eczema and Steroid Withdrawal Symptoms

Apple Cider Vinegar (ACV) has been used as a general cure-all for centuries. I remember trying it out a while ago for my eczema symptoms because I had read about how useful it was. Unfortunately, the version that I tried was the clear, pasteurised type, which has been heat treated to kill all the live stuff that gives ACV it's power, so it didn't work all that well and I resigned it to the pile of "treatments" that didn't help....UNTIL RECENTLY......

So what changed?

Well, a member of the Itsan forum, Ronda, created a thread all about how she uses ACV to treat her skin. She says:

"
One of the things that has been a life-safer for me during this TSW process is Apple Cider Vinegar (ACV).  I use Braggs because it is organic, raw, unfiltered, and unpasteurized.  ACV has been used for years, as far back as 400BC, Hippocrates used it as a healing aid.  It is anti-bacterial, anti-viral, and anti-fungal.  That being said, how have I used it and how has it helped me?

1.  I bathe in it 

When my skin was really raw and I had sores, I would soak in a tub with 1 cup of ACV and 1 cup of epsom salt.  I have been TSW since July of 2013, the first four and a half months were pretty much full-body flare.  Yet, I never developed an infection and I credit that to the anti-bacterial properties of the ACV.  It is also acts to balance the ph of the skin.  I found it to actually act as a moisturizer.

Now that my skin is in the dry stage, no longer rashy, I still bathe in it, but I have decreased the amount to 1/2 cup per bath.

2.  I drink it

Even though vinegar is acidic, when we drink it, it has an alkaline effect in our bodies. It also reacts to some toxins in our bodies, converting them into less toxic substances. Our bodies need a slightly alkaline pH balance to be healthy.

3.  I use it to alleviate itch

I mix 1/2 ACV with 1/2 distilled water in an empty bottle.  I soak a cotton ball with it and rub it on my skin.  When my skin was raw and rashy, I did this almost hourly.  It helped alleviate the itch and it "calmed" the skin down so it didn't feel so irritated.

4. I use it to heal sores

My hands were full of open sores and small cuts.  I continually put coconut oil on them covered them with cotton gloves and then vinyl gloves, but they weren't healing.  So, I decided to stop using the oil and use the ACV mixture on them and put them in the gloves.  Within two days, all of the sores were healed.  (My skin is still rough and thick, but the sores were all gone.)

If you want to know more about ACV, there are a lot of good sights on-line that are more in-depth about it's properties.  It has been such a blessing for me, that I wanted to share this with others.  I am not in any way saying it is a "cure" for the skin, but I am saying that it has been extremely helpful to me during my TSW.  Just my 2 cents worth!   "

Anyway, I was so impressed with Ronda's post that I went and ordered a bottle straight away. Ronda explained that it was important to buy the unpasteurised type, which contains something called "mother of vinegar". The "mother" is alive and contains all of the goodness. it makes the vinegar cloudy, which is why many companies remove it by heat treatment.

Here in the UK it is really hard to get hold of the cloudy ACV, but in the end I managed to get a bottle from Amazon relatively cheaply. I could not find it in any supermarkets or health food stores.

So far I have tried using it two ways: bathing in it and drinking it. I add a spoonful to a cup and dilute it with water and drink a couple of times a day. One benefit I noticed straight away was that it stopped me getting heartburn and acid reflux. ACV is said to alkalise the body, even though it is an acid and I would believe that this is true because I have stopped taking antacids at bedtime since drinking the ACV.

The other method I use is bathing. I take a half a cup of Epsom salt and add it to a full bath with an equal amount of ACV. It didn't sting me and I didn't feel any need to moisturise my skin after the bath, as my skin felt calm and soothed.

Many forum members have used diluted ACV directly on the skin using a spray bottle or cotton wool pad. It calms the itch. I imagine this would be especially good if you chilled the solution in the fridge beforehand.  It can also be used as a skin wash and hair rinse.

It is said that ACV can help weight loss, but I suppose I will have to wait to see if that proves to be true!

ACV is a really easy thing to add to your skincare regime and is cheap to buy so costs virtually nothing to try. If you don't like it on your skin, you can still use it on your salad...