Health Longevity Secrets

The Skin Creme That Nearly Killed Me

• Robert Lufkin MD • Episode 229

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A world champion athlete shouldn’t have to fight for the right diagnosis—yet Kelly Palace did, for years. What began as a swimmer’s quick fix for itchy, chlorine-dry skin became a descent into topical steroid addiction and withdrawal: spreading rashes, burning, oozing skin, misdiagnoses, and the long, lonely road of recovery. Kelly lays out the unvarnished truth about a “miracle cream” millions use and why the industry’s strongest selling points—fast relief and flawless skin—can mask a deeper problem that grows with every tube and refill.

We walk through the real mechanism under the surface: the blanching test that validated potency, the escalation from mild to super-potent products, and tachyphylaxis that drives dependency. Kelly explains how withdrawal can look nothing like classic eczema, why infants and facial skin absorb more, and how short, tightly defined courses can be appropriate for acute flares—while chronic use becomes a trap. Her journey to Dr. Marvin Rappaport’s work, the co-founding of ITSAN (International Topical Steroid Awareness Network), and the movement to push medicine to recognize topical steroid withdrawal provide a roadmap for patients seeking answers when standard care fails.

This is also a practical guide. You’ll hear the questions to ask before filling a prescription, the difference between treating symptoms and addressing root causes, and the lifestyle foundations—sleep, hydration, nutrition, stress reduction, gentle barrier care—that help the skin do its job. Kelly makes a compelling case to treat the skin like the longevity organ it is and to choose what you apply as carefully as what you eat. The human side matters too: the isolation, the mental health toll, and the hope that comes with recognizing the pattern and finding support.

If you or someone you love uses hydrocortisone, triamcinolone, or other topical steroids, this conversation will change how you think about risk, duration, and informed consent. Subscribe, share this episode with a friend or clinician who needs to hear it, and leave a review with your questions—what would you ask your doctor about your skin routine?

https://www.kellypalace.com/       

https://www.itsan.org/

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SPEAKER_01:

Hey Kelly, welcome to the program.

SPEAKER_00:

Hey Rob, thanks so much for having me. I'm happy to be here.

SPEAKER_01:

I'm so excited about today's conversation. A little background, you are a world swim champion and also a skin champion, sort of an elite masters athlete, currently still with world records under your belt, and the co-founder of ITSAN. We're going to find out what that actually means. It's a nonprofit leading the fight in the against the global epidemic of topical steroid addiction and withdrawal. But most importantly, you've written a blockbuster book that just dropped. It's out now that we're going to talk about also called False Cure How a Miracle Cream Fueled a Denied Epidemic and the Movement That Fought Back. I can't wait. So maybe start with your a little bit about your origin story and maybe even the exact moment you realize that the miracle cream you had you'd been given had been turned into a hidden epidemic inside your own body.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes. Well, I am really grateful to tell this story because I want it to help people. And I kind of joke that anyone who has skin should listen up because it's not just uh it doesn't just affect a certain population, it affects everyone from babies to the elderly and every color of skin around the world. And the way that I fell into this trap was simply that, you know, you alluded that I'm a swimmer. So I started swimming at a young age. And, you know, we swimmers, we get a little itchy, chlorine, dry skin. Very innocently, you can grab that tube of hydrocortisone cream, which is, you know, in most people's medicine cabinets, and use that, which most people don't realize that a hydrocortisone type cream is a steroid. And even you can take it a step further. What is a steroid? And then a steroid is something when you put it on your skin that it changes your whole, it's you know, it's a hormone, so it changes, and I, you know, I'm explaining this to you, you know, all of this, but this is for the lay person out there, someone, you know, a parent who sees a little itchy rash on their child and decides they're going to use this cream. So it's um, I started using this as a little swimmer, I was about 12, and I would use it hit or miss during my life or a little bit of you know, eczema around my eyes for my goggles, or maybe a little bit on my hands. And what we are learning today and finding out that it's it's a total steroid load over one's lifetime. So it's kind of like when you hit that proverbial straw that breaks the camel's back, that's when your body will lapse into something called steroid, topical steroid addiction. It's often created by a topical steroid, which again is a cream, it's a miracle cream, it's hydrocortisone, it's prescribed by dermatologists, GPs, nurse practitioners, pediatricians are very um have been using this for rashes. So anyone with a rash, and it can start out as a you know, a genetic rash, which is just eczema, or it can start out as a rash that is just a contact dermatitis, like you're you're allergic to your earrings or your your wedding ring or your watch, um, you know, whatever. And you can develop contact dermatitis where you fall into this trap. So at about 40, I had used um evidently I hit my steroid load, where we're talking about topical steroids, and we talked about the International Topical Steroid Addiction Network. I'm sorry, Topical Steroid Awareness Network, uh, where that spells Itzan. And that is to, that's the organization that brings light to this condition. But that was started. I started that 12 years ago with the dermatologist who has been blowing the whistle on this condition for decades. He he started this at UCLA in a clinic where he was seeing this reaction to topical steroids in the 1980s. So it's a long time coming. And um, that's when I was 40, I started to hit the skids with the rashes were spreading, my skin was getting red, it was oozing everywhere. It did not resemble regular eczema, and it just kept getting worse and worse and worse until I went. My uh chapter opens, um, which is called Down the Rabbit Hole, chapter two in the book, and it talks about how I went to five dermatologists in a row, and none of them could diagnose me with topical steroid addiction and withdrawal, because you're trying to go off of the steroids, but um, you know, one diagnosed me with a deep infection, so I had a lot of antibiotics. One diagnosed me with scabies, which I did not have, and I had to be coated in, you know, permethrin, which is an antiparasite, and uh another one uh just gave me soaking smears, which is where you put this all over your entire you soak in a hot tub. So when your pores are open, then there's a one-pound jar of triumsenolone, which is a mid-strength, you know, steroid. And then, you know, my husband put it all over me. And it just kept getting worse and worse and worse till I finally found Dr. Marvin J. Rappaport, who is the person that kind of figured this out. And and I emailed him and he said he was in California and I was in Florida, and he said, Stop all corticosteroids. And that was, and during that time that I was seeing these dermatologists, I was getting shots too, not just creams. I was getting creams, I was getting pills, I was getting shots, and um, and he said, Stop all of that, and then that's when all hell broke loose, because my body, which had been kind of in this up, you know, um upward trajectory of just more and more and more steroids. I went into a a small adrenal crisis because my body had been used to getting these corticosteroids and my blood pressure was severely low. They wanted to hospitalize me, and um, I I had to do a little bit more steroids, and then there's no tapering in this, but um then for a almost two years, Rob, I really could not wear clothes, it was just a full body molting of my skin. I mean, now I have you know creamy white skin, it goes away, but it takes years for some people. Um, we don't know exactly how long it takes. Some people, it takes five years, 10 years. Some people, if they have a smaller amount that affected them, um, but I couldn't wear clothes for a couple of years. I would just, it would be too painful. I was housebound for a couple of years. Um, and it was it was on my face, it was on my neck, it was all you know, all over my hands, yeah, every every square inch of my body, basically. Uh, so that was addiction. And then you slowly start healing. That's the withdrawal. But it's happening to infants, to babies, to, you know, the elderly, to people that can't afford to be off work. Fortunately, you know, my husband was supporting us through that time that I was not able to work, able to leave the house. So it's a real, it's a real crisis, and it's millions of people because eczema is one of the top conditions. I mean, I think there are 8 billion people in the world that have, I'm sorry, 8 billion people in the world, and then um of that percentage that that have eczema, they use topical steroids because it's the golden standard. It's the number one treatment for topical steroids, I mean, for um eczema. And then a large percentage of of that, so about about 12% of the people, this is a conservative number, that use topical steroids will succumb to topical steroid addiction. So that's that's a you know, it's about four million people in the US and about uh 60 to 70 million around the globe. And it it and the real tough part about it is it's just not being acknowledged by the medical community.

SPEAKER_01:

And so it sounds like from your personal journey, one take-home message for for our audience, certainly, if if you're using topical steroids and you, you know, you may have this condition, don't stop them without without talking to a a knowledgeable healthcare provider so they can deal with the potential side effects of stopping them, right? Even even stopping them, you went through you went through uh a whole list of issues, right?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, for sure. And the the beautiful advice in that, but also the flip side of that is it is very hard to find, even today, even 50 years after Dr. Rappaport has been, you know, beating the drum about this, to find a provider that actually will say, you have topical steroid withdrawal, and I'm gonna walk you through this. And usually it's just comfort medications that you need. So there are not a lot of doctors that are recognizing this, uh, especially in the dermatology community, because if they were to recognize it, then it would be their fault because they're the ones that are continually telling you that they're safe, they're continually prescribing them, they're using them way beyond what the package insert says. They they believe that they're safe. They weren't trained on these. You know, there were there was no training for topical steroid addiction and withdrawal. So it's hard for people who want to go off steroids to find a practitioner who's going to support them.

SPEAKER_01:

So, so let's back up a little bit for our for our audience, maybe for our listeners who've who've never heard of topical steroid withdrawal. What what what's a steroid you've touched on a little bit, but what's what's actually happening under the skin, biochemically, hormonally? How does it work?

SPEAKER_00:

Okay, so that's a great question. And what happens is when first I do this all the time. So my husband and I run five or 10K road races, and I'll I'll be running along next to somebody, and just because this is kind of my you know, my soapbox, I'll say, Hi, do you mind if I ask you, do you know what hydrocortisone is? And they'll say, um, I don't know. I I think it's some cream you buy in the drugstore. And I say, okay, so do you know that it's a steroid? No, I didn't know it was a steroid. So if you did know that it was a steroid, do you know what a steroid does? No, I don't even know what a steroid does. And then I'll ask someone randomly, do you know what a topical steroid is? And they'll say, Is that something that like bodybuilders use? Does it maybe strengthen your skin? And so this what happens with topical steroids is the way that they were brought to market is something called the blanching test. And so they put a little small dab of of a of a topical steroid cream on the um participants in the study's forearm. And if it blanched the size of, say, a dime, that was a low potency steroid because it just closed the blood vessels in that part of the skin down just that much. But then when it they used higher potency, it might show that it it blanched and closed down a red, you know, this is an inflamed part that it closed down maybe a quarter size or maybe a half dollar size. And then the super high potency would blanch all the way up and down the arm. So topical steroid addiction has gotten stronger because the pharmaceutical companies have ramped up the potencies. So, you know, if this if if X is good, then XXX must be better, and now there's XXXX. So it it's the blanching test because it you know, you have to wonder why. And and people use this in India for um skin lightening. Um, they use it for just making your face look better. You don't even need to have a rash, some some products hide it, you know, um, maybe overseas products that come in to just make your skin look creamy and white. Because if we all, you know, have different we might have flushed skin or you might have um ruddy skin or red skin. And if you put topical steroids on your skin, it will close down the blood vessels and it will make them look you it will make your skin look beautiful and creamy for that short period of time. And then what happens, Rob, is they uh have tachyphylaxis, which you know what that is. I love that word from being working for Pfizer for 12 years in the drug world. It means that they they stop working. So, in order, and then the blood vessels will open up, and so you need a stronger steroid. So, what happens, people get that initial effect of the in anti-inflammatory effect, then it wears off. They keep using it because they love the the reaction, the response, then they use a higher potency, and then that wears off, then they use a higher potency and that wears off, and then it's it's a shot, and then that wears off. So it gets it's so gets so big that eventually, so what happens? This is what they you know, again, more research is needed, but eventually you can't find enough steroids because you're going to get Cushing syndrome or you're going your body's gonna stop producing its own, you know, natural hormone of cortisol, which is what these are based on, corticosteroids. And then you just become this big your your pores are so wide open all over your body that you have something called cirrus exudate, and that will be oozing, coming from this these open pores that now cannot control themselves. And people wake up stuck to their sheets, stuck to their pillowcases. I mean, it is not a pretty nor a nice smelling. Um, it it sets you up for infections. It's um it's just it's just a living hell. And um that that is how the actual function of the steroid on your skin starts with that blanching test, shutting the steroids down, then they stop working, then your blood vessels are wide open, which is why this Dr. Rappaport initially brought this to market as um his the the condition called red skin syndrome, um, which your skin is red. It's really, really red. And a lot of times that is how people initially figure it out. They're like, wow, I just, you know, am I allergic to the sun? Am I allergic to my computer screen? And because your skin is so red. And that's how I Googled Red Red Skin, and I found Dr. Rappaport's article, Red Skin Syndrome to Eyelid Dermatitis to Red Skin Syndrome to Cure, was the name of his article that I found 15 years ago. And that's when I reached out to him, and this is how it all started.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I remember in medical school learning about steroids, cortical steroids, which these are, and you know, how powerful they are, and you know, certainly oral ones, you know, a pill or an injection of these, you know, affect your whole body so powerful. But we sort of were taught that, well, topical ones you don't have to worry as much because it's a smaller, smaller dose and all. But evidently, you know, that's obviously not true. And just to be clear, you're not saying never use topical steroids, but it's rather the situation where you use them persistently and develop this condition, correct?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, well, I'm definitely not saying never use them, but two weeks is what the actual package insert says, which no one actually adheres to. So, yes, if you're if you have a raging case of um poison ivy or a really bad contact dermatitis, but it's it's not gonna cure eczema because eczema is kind of a long-term genetic mutation. So why why use them there? I mean, unless you're in a really, really bad flair, very short amount of time. And then if you have contact dermatitis, it's probably gonna go away because it's something that you were touching. Maybe use it for a short amount of time. So definitely saying there is a place for them, but we really have to be um judicious about using them. And there's uh I follow uh on Instagram, I follow a mom who's got um her her hashtag is um or her handle is um TSW toddler. And her daughter, she used on her daughter's skin when she was little in a onesie, um one week on the face. And so you even have to think about the baby's um body ratio. So you've got a little tiny human who when you put like something that you would put on your face or I would put on my face, it's just affecting them more, and your your face is a lot more absorbent or more um thin skin. So it it affects the skin more. So these babies are having terrible reactions within a week. So it does it, you know, there has to be a real good place for them.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah. It's that that's such a such an important point. You mentioned eczema too, the genetic component to it. It's it's interesting. Some some people now we're hearing about people changing their lifestyle and even their diet and affecting eczema too. So there, you know, there are many things we need we we're learning about this all the time. Well, you you called your book False Cure. Why do you think this miracle drug story story with topical steroids has persisted for decades, even as patients start getting sicker?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I think because you know, one of the things, one of the theories that we run by is, you know, none of us are okay with having a little, you know, rash on our skin or a little, like we need to just give ourselves a little bit of a break, you know, and say, all right, I'm gonna I'm gonna go to work today with a zit, or I'm gonna go to work today with, you know, this a little bit of rash around my eyes when it would have gone away on our on its own. So I think we're always looking, you know, in this society for some kind of a miracle cream, some kind of a miracle pill, some something that's gonna smooth us out. And I think that's what the the topical steroid industry has perpetuated this. And it's it's pharmaceuticals companies, and you know, I I worked for Pfizer for 12 years, and it's um, you know, they are out there promoting this, and it's a it's a multi-billion dollar annual market. So um there is definitely a need for it. Um, there's definitely a market for it, maybe. I'm not sure I should say need, but there's definitely a market for this, and it's being promoted by pharmaceutical companies. So, you know, they they come out with new formulations, new foams, new creams, new ointments, new pills, new everything. And it's all about this um treating the symptom and not the root cause. I'm a full believer that eczema has some genetic components. I mean, people that are atopic. I mean, I'm a you know, Irish heritage with light skin and sensitive skin, but I can certainly have much more control over my skin being sensitive when I eat more healthy and my stress is lower. And, you know, there are just things that will treat the root cause. And I think people are looking for that fast, that fast fix, which is a false cure when the hard cure is the real cure is let's get more sleep, let's drink more water, let's reduce our stress, let's do some exercise, let's put down the sugar, let's put down the the processed food. Those are the things that we could be doing to be healthier instead of reaching for these false cures. And, you know, I was thinking, um, you know, my my adult master's podcast about adult athletes. I thought, you know, maybe I should start a podcast called False Cure, because we could talk to many industry industries, Rob, that have false cures. There's all kinds of false cures going on out there, but this was the one that was, you know, personal to me.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah. I mean, uh you you went from literally fighting for your own life to co-founding your organization, It San. So what flipped the switch for you from uh being a survivor to becoming a global activist?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, it's just once I realized because people are lost in this hole of looking for what's wrong with them, and they're going to doctor after doctor after doctor, and they don't have eczema anymore. They don't have some kind of a weird rash, they have topical steroid addiction, and it is a prison. I know tons of families, hundreds of families who've looked for that thing that's causing their their skin to go out of control. Is it the carpet? They move, they they rip their drywall out. Is there, you know, is there mold behind the walls? They are looking, looking and looking just like I was. And when I found that answer and I became cured, you know, like, oh my gosh, I've been in this hell searching for, you know, following the steroid hole, going down the steroid rabbit hole for about three or four years before I found Dr. Rappaport. And then once I found that that was the cure and I started seeing my cure, I just said, I've got to get this, I've got to get this out there to the world because it so if I'm suffering from this, so many people around the world are. And it would just, you know, I think there are just people out there that that do that, you know, that you just say, if this is happening to me, it's got to be happening to someone else. And that was kind of pre-uh hashtags and pre-internet, and there wasn't one video, there wasn't one hashtag, there wasn't anything about topical steroid addiction and withdrawal. In that we started that in 09. So actually, we didn't start a nonprofit, Dr. Rappaport and I together. And I was just the the sharer, you know. As I say, there's the doctor who dares, there's the patient who shares, and there's the organization that cares. And that's it. And so I just shared his work, his paper. He's the doctor, he's the UCLA dermatologist, you know, MD of medicine and dermatology from UCLA. This guy has all the credentials. He is, he has been talking about this forever, and he's he's like the Simelwise um of you know, Similwise who said, wash your hands, the medical um births that were the doctors were doing autopsies in the morning, and then they were delivering babies in the in the afternoon and they weren't washing their hands. And Dr. Simmelwise said, Hey, you need to wash your hands. And then the the births started, you know, there was a reduction in the um maternal death birth rates. So there are a lot of doctors like that. Barry Marshall, who swallowed H. pylori when he said, This is what's causing it. Um, this is what's causing ulcers. And so Dr. Rappaport is part of that. He he has stood up against medical dogma, he's 89 years old this month, and he has really been, you know, that was a huge part of the reason that I wrote the book. But I've been carrying his message, and then it sans been carrying it. Um, but it just it's just something that when you can free someone through these, through this, you know, the when we first started, I just threw up a website because Dr. Rappaport, again, he when I met him, he was in his 70s, he didn't know anything about the uh the internet. I just found his article. Um, so I had this woman from Jordan, you know, the country, say, This is happening to my daughter, and she went through the topical story. And we I got hundreds of emails from all over the world in 09. And um, this woman said, I want to come to the US and wash your feet. It was like people are so um thankful when they find the answer, it gives you hope.

SPEAKER_01:

I don't know if I'm allowed to say this, but um uh no one will believe it anyway. But you're you you mentioned it in the book. You are 64 years old. You don't look at it all, but you're also a world record swimmer and a skin champion. And so how how do you see skin as more than cosmetic, perhaps as a longevity organ?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, well, it's uh thank you. I um I feel like your skin is your largest organ, which we say all the time in this cause that if someone had what we go through with topical steroid addiction, if someone had a heart condition like that, or a liver condition, or a back condition, or a brain condition, your skin is your largest organ. And so um, I I joke my husband jokes again. I I think I told you this before we started recording that my husband is 12 years younger than I am, and I don't have any gray hair, I don't dye my hair. Um, he is fully gray, even though he's, you know, again, 12 years younger. And I believe that we my skin molted off. Like a lot of my friends, I look way better in my 60s than I did when I was going through topical steroid withdrawal in my 50s. I think it sloughed off all the skin. So, but I I do think your skin is a huge indicator of health. I think that it's really important that we know and learn. We've learned now, and I've certainly learned it going through um, you know, menopause, being way on the other side of menopause, but having used short, a short amount of um hormone replacement therapy, which was a cream. So bioidentical hormones that you put on your skin, that we need to learn that everything we put on our skin is like eating it. You know, we're learning that now that uh there's websites that say this is an endocrine system disruptor from sunscreens to makeup to you know shampoos and all kinds of things. So I think our skin is so just you know, it's it's just skin, you know, like you were taught in medical school. Oh, it's safe, you you can use topical steroids on your skin. Everything we're putting on our skin is going into our body. And now I don't put anything on my skin that I can't eat. And that is just my my standard, my my rule. So yeah, we've got to take care of our skin and drinking water, of course, and being careful what we put on it. And and you know, that's why I'm kind of a skin champion that way, but it it rhymes. I mean, I'm a swim swim champion um from adult master swimming, and um, and then I I want to champion people to take care of their skin and be really careful what they put on it.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, that's such a good point about skin, you know, with it what we eat, we have the FDA that, you know, such as it is, I mean it's it's far from perfect, but at least there are some regulations about what can go into food and what can't go into food. There's really nothing at that level about what we apply to our skins. Yet, as you point out, we literally absorb it through our skins just like we do if we were eating it or in similar fashions, especially you know, stuff we use, shampoo, deodorants if we use those, you know, creams, all those things. It's it's really the wild west out there, out there for those. Um, I love your book. Uh people have gotta get it and read it. You you share some wild stories in there from you know, crab, cosplay, boxing gloves, and the least romantic night of your marriage. Yeah. Which which one best captures the madness of the journey?

SPEAKER_00:

I I think the least romantic night of the of the marriage. Um the there this was going down the rabbit hole where you know, I was clearly should have stopped using steroids, but I went to dermatologist and this one dermatologist diagnosed me with scabies because that's what my skin was just red all over. And she said, Let's just treat you for scabies. Well, not that I and I write in the book, scabies, you know, are more likely picked up in a prison than at my local swimming pool, which is what I was doing. But the problem when you get treated with scabies is you have to treat your bed fellow. So my poor husband. Was cut we had to cover ourselves head to toe in permethrin, which is a thick, stinky, like think of Vaseline that has a horrible odor. And we coated ourselves from the bottom of our ears, chin down, all the way down. And we had to boil sheets and you know, like desensitized the whole house from scabies. And um, you know, my husband and I were falling asleep, we're in bed, we're both coated, we're just laying there, and I write, this is like a zombie apocalypse. And we both side-eyed each other. My husband said, I think we've reached a new low. And um, we really, we really hadn't, uh, we hadn't at that point because I hadn't even figured out what was causing it.

SPEAKER_01:

Well, if if we were able to get every dermatologist in the world to get them all together in one room, what would be your one-sentence prescription for them or message?

SPEAKER_00:

Oh gosh, gosh, that would be the ideal thing. It would be, I think it would be this just open your eyes and see the difference in eczema and topical steroid addiction. And and you know, we know that you don't want to harm us. We know that. I mean, I I come from five generations of doctors, and I love doctors and I love dermatologists. I just want them to open their eyes and see that they're they're distinctly different. And this this is Dr. Rappaport's words and Dr. Fukaya's words, and the doctors that are now on board, and Dr. Leo's words, um, they're distinctly different patterns, and take the time to see those and hear us because we're alone and and we need doctors to help us through this.

SPEAKER_01:

And and and now a message for parents. So if a doctor prescribes steroids for a baby's rash, what should they, what question should they ask before filling that that script?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes. Does this contain a steroid? Is one um thing. And and the reason this book is kind of whistleblowing and a little bit controversial is um there's a there's a dermatologist who is giving a CME at a dermatology conference, and he actually instructs his fellow dermatologist to avoid the question, is this a steroid? He says, I tell them it's an anti-inflammatory, all natural product that works with your immune system. And he says, I don't answer the question that I don't want to answer. And so he's he's telling other dermatologists to actually mislead them. I don't think that he is the rule, but I think that that's where the medical dogma is. But I would say to parents, does this, is this really an emergency? I mean, so many of the parents that I've talked with over the last 15 years is, gosh, I would so go back to that one little bit of eczema or that one scratch to go back in time, you know, to have a time machine to say, wow, I wish I hadn't used that. But does it really need a steroid? And is it a steroid? And could coconut oil or could just a good moisturizer or could, you know, changing the diet something? But does a child really need, who's not in full development, do they really need a hormone-disrupting steroid?

SPEAKER_01:

So so now you've written the book False Cure, which I again recommend to everybody. You've built the nonprofit It SAN, and you're still breaking world swim records. So what's the one thing you want your legacy, legacy to be in in all these areas?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I think um more than anything, it's that I helped people from suffering to stay out of the ditch of topical steroid addiction and withdrawal. That that is the thing that I would want on my tombstone, would just be please be very careful with these. They're real, they're real problem, they can initiate real problems. And you know, just just be cautious because it's it's it's a hell that it's really hard to describe. And one of the stats I didn't um give is it a study of people going through TSW. 47% of people going through TSW had suicidal ideation. And I was one of them. You know, it's just when your skin is messed up, your appearance, you can't perform, you can't, there's really nothing you can do when your entire body is involved and you're itching and you can't sleep, and um, you just wanna, you know, you really want to not be around. It's not like many of us had that active, like, I'm gonna do this to kill myself, but it was kind of like I wish that I weren't alive, and that's real. So if I can stop one person, one family from overdoing topical steroids, that will be a huge legacy.

SPEAKER_01:

Well, that's such a such a great point. And thank you so much, Kelly, for being with us here uh on this program and sharing sharing your experience. And uh hopefully I'd love to get you back on and uh talk some more about this in the future.

SPEAKER_00:

Thank you so much for giving me the the uh ability to reach your audience and amplifying my voice and the endorsement of the book. I'm a huge fan of yours, and you're doing the same thing, and I'm just really, really grateful for you.

SPEAKER_01:

Kelly Palace is the author, the book is you've gotta get is called False Cure How a Miracle Cream Fueled a Denied Epidemic and the Movement That Fought Back. Don't don't miss it. Thanks again, Kelly. We'll see you next time.

SPEAKER_00:

Thank you.