Woman's face 'erupted into red-hot furnace' - and water made it worse

27 December 2023 , 14:13

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Anna said her face turned into a 'red-hot furnace' on Christmas Day

A mum-of-two has shared how her face suddenly turned into a "red-hot furnace" on Christmas Day.

Anna Rees, a 44-year-old NHS project manager, said the flare-up while preparing Christmas dinner in 2021 made her look like "Rudolph" and left her feeling incredibly self-conscious.

Heat from the cooking made her skin "suddenly erupt", and she rushed upstairs to splash cold water on it to try to cool it down - but the painful problem stuck around for the entire festive period and beyond.

Anna avoided family photographs, and started to worry about why her skin had turned so red. She continued to have a bright red face with spots for the next few months, something which she said "felt horrible", as she never expected to have acne in her 40s.

Heat from cooking Christmas Dinner made her skin 'suddenly erupt', and the redness took a long time to shift

Anna now uses rosacea cream and hopes this festive season will 'not be ruined' by her skin

Her GP prescribed her antibiotics - but told her it would not make the redness go away. Explaining what happened, she told PA Real Life: "I was helping my husband cook the Christmas lunch and having some wine, and the heat from the cooking plus the wine made my skin suddenly erupt. It felt like my skin went crazy – I rushed upstairs to try and splash some cold water on it but that just made it worse. I thought it was just some kind of reaction to something I had eaten or drunk or some kind of cooking spice I had maybe rubbed into my skin accidentally, but the bumpy redness remained for the rest of the Christmas holiday."

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Anna from Stroud, Gloucestershire, felt incredibly self-conscious going to Christmas parties and even avoided family photographs. She also found that if she had a drink, such as a glass of wine, it made her skin "so much worse", leaving it "really sensitive" and bumpy. "It was just really frustrating because it felt like it kind of came out of nowhere, really", she added.

While Anna says she put on a brave face by making jokes about her skin, secretly she was deeply worried. She said: “I tried to cover it up with loads of make-up but it didn’t really do anything. I made jokes about being the Christmas Rudolph to try and laugh it off but underneath I was really worried about what was going on with my skin.”

Improvement only came when she found a selection of creams and cleaners made from capers by the skin care range Kalme, which can help with rosacea. After using a collection of their products for around three months, Anna says her spots have gone, with her rosacea kept at bay. She has said the new remedy has "changed her life", and she hopes this festive season will "not be ruined" by her skin.

Benedict Tetzlaff-Deas