No Allbling, still cannot eliminate the culprit, have a feeling it may be all things containing soak off gel.
Later last night I applied a gel called 'chroma gel' (it is a base and top all in one, that you use regular polish with like a sandwich), I had previously tried this for two days and it had been fine, anyway, I applied the base chromagel and the GOSH brand of regular polish, left it to dry overnight, intending to put the top on this morning, but I awoke at 1am, with incredible itching, swelling and redness, came downstairs and spent the next 2 hours soaking off the whole lot and soaking my poor fingers in salt solution
Nancy, I know 2 geleration colours and one gelish colour so far have been a problem, but I am now thinking it is the whole soak off gel system that is an irritant to me. My fingers are so sore today and are starting to blister, I will have to avoid everything nail related until my fingers are back to normal which may take a while!
Sorry, this is going to be a long post. I was going to send this as a PM, but then thought others who might encounter this problem might find the information on going about an elimination test helpful, so decided to go ahead and post it here.
I think there has to be something in the SOG's that's making you react. I can't imagine it would be the curing process itself, but I guess anything is possible. I guess you could put your hands in and out of the light like you would if you were doing a manicure, but not actually do one, and see if that alone did anything, but I don't see how it possibly could!
My initial thought, as you say with the chromagel you used regular nail polish and still reacted, but hadn't to the chromagel alone is that you are reacting either to a pigment/dye, or a solvent that's found in nail polish and many of the SOG's. Not srue if the solvents are the same, but may be of the same derivative. I'm not a chemist, so that one is out of my league. if it's a solvent, one of the pure pigmented gels that have no solvents might work for you. However, I think the base/topcoats have solvents as well, which makes me wonder if it's a dye or pigment. Sorry, thinking out loud there.
Curious though - have you started anything new lately? A new medication, new lotion, soap, shampoo, cuticle oil, etc. Could there be ANYTHING new that maybe something in the SOG is reacting with or creating an increased sensitivity? Or even a new alcohol or acetone brand or bottle (new brand could be different processing, new bottle could be bad/contaminated batch)?
First Of course you need to let your fingers heal. Do just basic manicures with only shaping and moisturizing with cuticle oil. If you react here, then you'd have less things to eliminate, as it could only then be either the cuticle oil or something you use in a basic manicure.
Once healed, Then you need to systematically do a true elimination test. It's a long, slow process, but it may be the only way to isolate the problem and see if there are still products you can use.
Separate out each and every step of your manicure process, however minimal it seems. I would make a list so it will be easier to cross things off as reaction ("not safe") or no reaction ("safe"), and make notes as to if there was any irritation how severe it is, etc.
You'll want to try each thing for several days to a week without adding anything new. think about a food elimination diet. Say you are allergic to something in a fruit salad, but aren't sure what. You would cut out all fruit, then start eating one fruit at a time, and eat that fruit only for a week. If no reaction to it, you'd spend the next week eating a different fruit, and so on until you found the one you were allergic to. Does that make sense? I hope so, but My brain is tired from 2 hellish days of working under construction so you never know!! LOL.
I would do these tests only on one finger, as was mentioned before. And, for the purpose of this at least, I would not mix brands except where you have to (like using different brands of base/top/color), for example you have a geleration color but not geleration base and topcoat. Since this could even be a reaction to a pigment, I would list each of your colors individually, test one color in each brand initially. as you find "safe" brands, you can keep that list and mark off colors you use when there is no reaction. if you suddenly react to one later down the road in a "safe" brand, then i would definitely suspect a dye or pigment or something within that specific color.
So, here is what I would do. Start with even the most basic of things you use for your manicure. things that seem the most benign, like the cotton balls or wipes you use for removing the sticky layer. Take a plain one with nothing on it and rub it over your nail and fingertip. See if anything happens. If not, cross that off your list as "Safe" (meaning causing no reaction). Even something as simple as that can cause a reaction - cottonballs are bleached and processed for example. That item is now "safe" and eliminated from possible causes to the reaction.
Now, use your "safe" cotton ball/wipe to rub some alcohol on a nail and fingertip. See if anything happens. If not, that is now considered safe.
Next use the safe cotton ball/wipe to rub some acetone on your nail and fingertip. If no reaction it too is considered safe.
If you use a dehydrator product, try that next. put it on just one nail and see if there is any reaction
Next apply basecoat. I know you have several brands, and you were OK this last time, so if you feel safe doing so, use one brand on each finger and note which is which. The downside I see to this is that your fingers touch each other, so it can mess with the process of elimination by adding a variable. I would pick your favorite base and topcoat and use that one first, then worry about the others at a later date. At any rate, apply the basecoat only and leave it alone a few days. If no reaction, you can likely consider it safe, since your reaction seems to happen pretty quickly.
Next I would actually try the topcoat - since you can't really apply the color without topcoat, you need to eliminate your topcoat from the list of potential things you are reacting to. Use the same brand of topcoat as your basecoat. Using the same brand eliminates the variable of possible reactions between products (even though I know many of us mix and are fine, you just don't want any extra variables in elimination tests). Apply the topcoat and leave the manicure alone a few days to see what happens. if there is no reaction your topcoat would be considered safe.
Next, apply a color. If possible use the same brand as your base and topcoat, again to eliminate a variable. In the future, you'd have to use this same base and topcoat with all your brands of color, or do the elimination process with each brand of base and topcoat you have. But anyway, apply the color and cure, topcoat and cure. At this point if you haven't reacted, you've determined everything except the colors safe.
If you had no reaction to that, then you'd have to start systematically trying different brands and the different colors within those brands until you found which you were reacting to, then try to find a like aspect of what is causing the reactions, whether it be all one brand, or all colors that likely contained the same dye/pigment (for example, you reacted to anything red).
You could do this same with regular polishes. It's easy to apply regular polish over the topcoat of a SOG mani, so even if you just have base/top under regular polish, if you reacted that'd be quick to take off, and if your base/top have been deemed safe then maybe it wouldn't be such a painful process.
Hope some of this gives you at least some ideas on how to try the elimination process. Feel free to PM me if you have questions, or if you read through this and none of it makes sense, LOL.
I know sometimes I don't type things out in a logical order when i'm tired!
