Everything About Me is Sensitive (Especially my Skin)

Okay. Now I'm hoping this isn't going to be a TMI post. I don't personally see how it can be, but apparently there are some people in the world for whom any discussion about anything more personal than the weather is a bit Too Much Information.

And they'll tell you that, too, in that rude, abrasive way of theirs. "Whoa! I didn't need to know that!" they'll say, often holding up their hands in a please-don't-throw-that-bag-of-poop-at-me kind of gesture. And they'll say that when you mention something totally innocuous, like that your husband is like a radiator and you have started sleeping without covers on because of it (appropos of a conversation about your child's fever, btw, not just as a greeting. "Good morning! My husband's body temperature is so high sometimes I want stab him with a fork in his sleep to get him to stop trying to snuggle with me, ha ha! And how are you?" etc.)

Or perhaps you've mentioned that your socks have a hole in the toe, or that you like eating lemon cake for breakfast. The reaction to such harmless bits of personal trivia is always the same. That shocked and horrified face, and the implication that you've committed a ghastly fauz pas. As if you'd performed a breast self-exam in public.

You know, I used to know a girl who constantly gave way TMI. I mean, this was Too Much Information on subjects about which any info was too much. Like her sex life. And the acts she performed on her boyfriend while he was on the phone, or the, ah, level of lubri--you know what? I can't even bring myself to repeat it here, and I write sex for a living. (But this is a blog, and I do try to keep it at least somewhat clean here. I can say fuck all I want, but I don't generally describe it.) Suffice it to say that the girl got graphic (say that three times fast) all the time. And nobody wanted to hear that shit.

But you know what? We all just sort of smiled politely and changed the subject. Because none of us were the types of assholes who belittle people for thinking we care more about them than we do.

So you tell me. Is saying--to someone who can, by the way, clearly see the truth of my words right there on my face--that in the last few weeks my skin has suddenly gone bone-dry and flaky, and is now turning scaly, red, and puffy on my eyelids, making me resemble a--well, a scaly, red, puffy-eyed thing--Too Much Information? Because I feel the need to at least let people know that I'm aware of the sudden red roughness of my skin. Lest they think I failed to notice when I look in the mirror a million times a day to assess whether or not the redness is creeping down my cheeks now, or what.

So there you go. I have now revealed a Secret About Myself, one which I assume is now making you all shift uncomfortably in your seats and glance guiltily around the room, hoping nobody sees the filth you're reading.

And when you're done feeling ashmed of yourself and shocked at my depraved openness, does anybody have any ideas for how to soothe this mess? I switched from my regular cleanser, which went overnight from lovely to turns-me-bright-red-for-hours, to cold cream, because cold cream usually soothes me when my very sensitive skin flares up. But while it seems to be helping in most areas, I've suddenly got this eye thing and I'm pretty sure it is on my cheeks now, too.