On Hiatus

I am writing today to inform those of you that follow my blog that it will be on hiatus for an indeterminate amount of time, probably around a couple months. It is not a choice that I have made, rather a choice that has been forced upon me by an unfortunate circumstance.

You see, a few months ago I decided to make the switch to using OPI Nail Envy as a strengthener. It had been personally recommended to me a few times and I've heard nothing but good reviews. I was reluctant to purchase it as I found it to be a bit pricey, but when I found it on sale for $10 I couldn't resist taking advantage of the opportunity. I eagerly began to apply it as a base coat under all my manicures, excited to see the benefits that everyone else had raved about. Unfortunately that's not how things went for me.

A few weeks in I began to experience some pain in my nail beds and in the skin around my nails a few minutes after application. It didn't happen every time I applied polish, but became more and more frequent. At first it was bearable and I would just ignore it, but eventually it got to the point that I had to take my polish off and run my fingers under cold water to alleviate the symptoms. I knew this was not normal, but I thought I must be using it wrong. The fact that I might be allergic to it also crossed my mind, so I turned to the internet for advice. I was told I should stop wearing it, that the pain wasn't normal, and that I was likely having a reaction to it. This was all good advice, and it was advice I should have taken. At this point, however, I noticed that the pain only occurred when I painted my nails immediately after removing my old nail polish. If I took a break and washed my hands thoroughly in between then everything was fine. I decided that clearly it was a reaction between the Nail Envy and the nail polish removed, and once I began taking steps to make sure they did not come in contact then life was peachy keen again.

In July, I began a new job. While I love it and am very happy to be working at this company, the work is not very kind to my fingernails. I first started noticing my nails lifting slightly shortly after I started. I mentioned it to one of my coworkers, and they assured me that it had happened to them too. It was normal. As it didn't seem to be progressing much, I stopped worrying about it. Until one day, at the start of August, I took off my nail polish and the lifting had seriously progressed in a very short period of time. They looked diseased. I knew as soon as I saw it that I could no longer deny what was happening. My pinky and ringer fingers are the most affected, which doesn't make sense if it were trauma from work. No, it was clear that I was paying for my stubbornness and denial. I immediately stopped wearing Nail Envy, though I continued to wear polish with no base or top coat so that I didn't freak out the patients I work with.

After a week I wasn't seeing much improvement. I decided to give my nails a breather for the weekend. This was also a weekend where my boyfriend and I were doing a deep clean of the apartment. The cleaning products, combined with scrubbing and frequent hand washing, caused my nails to worsen significantly in a matter of a few hours. Worried that they were going to fall off completely, I finally consulted a professional on how to keep from making it worse. I need to wear gloves at work to prevent trauma and to stop me from washing my hands all the time, as getting your nails wet repeatedly can make them lift more. I was also told to cut my nails as short as I was comfortable with (some of them would end up really short if I cut them all the way down) to help protect them. Finally, and the reason my blog is now on hiatus, I was told I shouldn't be wearing nail polish at all. I'm not comfortable going to work with my nails uncovered as I have reason to believe that some patients may mistake my issue for nail fungus and not want me to work on them, so they recommended a polish free of the bad chemicals that cause the most problems with nails. I have one bottle, one colour, that my nails will be until they grow back out, and that doesn't make for very exciting blog posts.

So there you have it. I believe it will take a few months for my nails to grow back out properly, and as soon as they do I'll be back painting them all kinds of colours again. In the meantime, I'm going to be resting them and taking care of them so I can get back as soon as possible.

Until then!

-Danielle