this post was submitted on 31 Aug 2025
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Is it possible some of it rubbed off and is still in your environment? On your bag, a couch cushion where you sat upon returning, the laundry basket you dropped your clothes into, a hat, a hairbrush, your car? I am not sure any of those chemicals would last for months but makes sense to be extra very careful to clean everything up. And if you have symptoms, try to think if there is any object that connects that could be carrying irritant.
The longer it goes on the less likely that's the correct explanation. If it's certainly just going on inside your body then ideally you'd go to see someone to check checked out because it's a chemical problem of some sort. The only vague guess I have is some sort of cycled immune response like how some people with asthma get triggered by a cold. Even after the cold is cured your body is stuck in a loop trying to fight against it, and just ends up fighting itself. You think you have a cold going on forever but it's just your body beating itself up. (Story of my life srsly.) So you need to have a steroid puffer to chill it out. (But puffers only work on the lungs so that wouldn't help here.)
The only thing I can think of if you want to exhaust all the over the counter options would be trying an anti histamine (allergy medication). I don't think it's actually the right thing but if you have some laying around give it a shot. A more specific prescription med could help your body to get out of the rut. If I was you I would take pictures on my phone of the most severe visible symptoms. Swelling, skin problems, redness. In case you have "bad luck" to feel OK on the day your appointment comes. They might not take you seriously and you get blown off. So be prepared to show unsubtle pics of your misery.
I wouldn't exclude the possibility of a different cause. You know your life and I do not but try to think of there is anything that you could be intermittently exposed to. Maybe your lover occasionally slathers themselves in some lotion you don't even know about. Downstairs neighbour has a weird hobby and fumes are getting in to your bedroom. Cat goes and rolls around in an industrial waste dumping ground then comes home to curl up on your face.
Sorry you feel like shit. It'll probably not last for decades.
The basics are:
i was extremely conscientious of the exposure and removing any kind of irritant contamination from my c lothes. i stripped immediately on getting home, washed everything, washed everything i touched incidentally. Anything washable was washed. any surface was scrubbed.
i would wonder if it's something else as far as cause, but nothing else makes sense, and the symptoms consistently just imitate post-exposure symptoms
My sibling had recurrent poison ivy because they touched a light switch. Just gonna toss that out there - it could be residue on something real random
Well if you are certain to have eliminated new exposures, the cause might not be too important if there is a drug to interrupt it. Because the actual instigator is gone and no longer relevant.
Like some people get asthma after a cold, but you can get it from smoke too. If it's 5 days after your cold is cured, or the smoke is cleared, the treatment is the same in either case because the problem is the immune system.
In your case it would be useful to know for next time you go to a protest of course. Especially if you find something that treats it.
Have your own clothes washing machine and clothes dryer or do you use a laundromat?
If you've got your own laundry machines... maybe bath towels got contaminated somehow?
Mixed contaminated clothes with bath towels in the washing machine? Or washed towels afterwards for a chance at residue transfering between washes?
A significant portion of a regular sized clothes washing machine is never actually submerged, it might get a bit of water spashed on it but there won't be any soapy water or agitating laundry touching the surfaces scrubbing anything nefarious away.
Shit might have transfered to to the dryer too... but after a few months of regular weekly+ clothes drying at high heat I'd imagine that it would have broken down by now.