burning red (fire red) around lips... top lip bottom lip... easily irritated, always dry and peeling... sometimes it looked my my lips were alot bigger than they wore because the skin above and below the lips was so red.

I had this for many years, at least the past 15 years (I am now 32).

If no one has ever posted a question about his condition in the Ask Andreas Forum , I would. He is extremely knowledgeable, and treats conditions from their root cause as opposed to just symptoms.

John g

Started suffering in summer of 1996, saw PCP, derms, dentists, etc. Suffered, (SUFFERED!) through three more years of college, trying all kinds of OTC and prescription meds. Tried Elimination Diets (at one time I actually ate only yams and steamed zuchini for two weeks, I lost about 15lbs, and I'm not a heavy person; possibly could make millions from a book about the zuchini/ yam diet).

I would describe the outer layer of skin on my lips while suffering as "paper-like". Get it wet and it turns soggy and peels away. Try to keep it from getting wet and it gets hard, more painful and eventually peels off anyway. As I recall, I would usually peel it off and try to keep vaseline on my lips constantly as the new skin would generate, hoping it would grow back normal - It never did.

I once wrote a 5 page Word document about my symptoms and all the treatments I had tried (some conventional/ some not so), I wish I still had it to share with you. You go a little bit crazy from suffering from this, at one point I actually put Elmers glue on my lips. You go crazy, in part, because you wonder if a.)is it something you're doing, so you become absolutely paranoid about licking or biting b.) ultimately you feel stupid about seeking professional help for it. I went almost two years before I broke down and went to a doctor at all, or even told anyone (friends, family, etc.) that I thought something was wrong. Ultil I did, I just made excuses for why I didn't always want want to go out and drink beers in college (after a night of drinking - the lips would be worse and more painful than ever.)

To make a long story short. I moved to NY after college and had actually given up completely on curing the condition. I had decided that the best thing for my sanity was to resign myself to carry around Vaseline and get on with my life. Then for some reason I decided to try one more time to cure it about 3 years ago (I think the thought occurred to me "I'm content now, but what if, because of my gross neglect of this problem, some day it gets even worse and my lips end up as a photo in a medical journal"). I seeked out the best in the field, and ended up at Johns Hopkins in the office of Dr. James Sciubba.

He prescribed Lamprene, the rest is history.

As I said, I don't think my lips are what they were before about 6 years of hell, and I still carry around a small vaseline almost everywhere. It some ways I don't even remember what my lips were like before.

But I am one hell of a lot better now, thanks to Dr. Sciubba and Lamprene.

hello,

I also had some sort of lip sores. It started around the end of Jan and nearly left. However by the 2nd week of Feb, I got a sudden flare up and it just got worse. It seemed as if the first one was a pimple on my lip-never experended that before. It seemed to "pop" and go away. But it never healed entirely. about 2 weeks ago, different parts of my lips were beginning to swell, turn red, and delelope a white sore on them. Needless to say eating, smiling, and talking were quite difficult as the situation just got worse.

3 days ago, I decided to get tough on the situation. I went to Sunflower Market and bought some fresh sage to apply the paste, some grapefruit seed extract, and aloe vera gel. I was going to get vasaline at a dept store, but decided to look for it here first. The lady who worked there said that there is petroleum( you know the stuff we put in our cars) in vasaline and we probably shouldn't be getting that stuff into our bodies. And of course the skin absorbes whatever we put onto it. So they had some vasline type thing there without the petroleum. However, I also found some aloe vera gel and some other gel like things I thought might help. After looking at everything for some time, I choice some gel with additional vitamins in it.

I took the grapefruit seed extract in a small glass of water, 15 drops 3 times a day (remember to stir the water, otherwise it will sit at the bottom). Used the sage paste 3 times the first day, twice on the second, and didn't need it on the 3rd. The sage brought relief...it really did. I mixed mine with the healthiest oil I know of, coconut from the Maker's Diet. The aloe vera gel hurt a little, but I kept using it. I totally stopped chapsticlike moisterizer being that it hurt too much to apply it and also that I don't know the medications that are in it and what it may have been doing.

I stayed away from acid food. Drank water first thing in the morning, 2 glasses plus a small glass of the grapefruit extract as well. (water in the morning will help cleans the body from toxins) and ate as well as I could throughout the day. I also stayed away from Sugar and white bread. (because if this was a sympom of something going on perhaps in my digestive track, the Sugar and white bread would only help the bad bacteria to grow and hurt the good).

I only drank water(reverse osmosis) and green tea. I added real honey and echinea to it and a little bit of lemon. I don't know if it helped or not, but I also took Garden of Life's Seasonal Relief (3 capsuls on an empty stomach) and RM-10 (1 capsul with food). I can't remmeber how many times I took it, just whenever I thought of them.

I also purchased goat yogurt 2 days prior and had been eating that to build up the good bactriua in my body. I don't know if that helped or not.

when I thought I couldn't bare the pain any more, I did all the above starting Fri morning-besides the yogurt- and on Sunday night, I could smile once again...it was as if the locks on my lips had been released. Praise the Lord:) Monday mornign now, and the white like things that had been swelling and oozing, fell off and my lip just looks a little red. Nothing like how it's been for about 2 weeks now. Praise Jesus:)

But I need to mention that Sat nothing felt better yet. In fact, it was very painful to the point of tears. Even on Sunday morning whem I was at church, it was still very painful. But Sunday night, everything seemed to get better.

So with lots of prayer and helping your body out the best that you can, I hope this might bring some relief to someone else.

When you posts again I suggest that you post on the current page of the Peeling lips forum. This is a 10 year old thread and most people won't be around anymore.