Let's Talk About My Weird Hands

Today I would like to talk about something

a little bit different. I want to talk

about my weird hands and my fingers and

how they are very long, as people in the

comments like to keep pointing out.

Yes, I do have kind of strange hands, and

yes, I am kind of insecure about them,

but I think I'm mature enough now to be

able to accept the fact that I do have

kind of strange-looking hands. Well, not

just my hands, my entire body looks kind

of strange, but you know, that's a

different story for a different day. For

my whole life, people have been making fun

of my hands and my fingers. Ever since I

was a young child going to school, all the

other kids used to make fun of me all the

time about my weird-looking hands, and I

became very insecure and self-conscious

about how strange my hands look. It's

definitely a genetic thing because my dad

also had very long fingers, And also my

uncles all have very long fingers, but

their fingers don't look as long as mine

do because mine look very skinny. You

might notice that the inside of my fingers

and my palms look very dry and flaky, and

that's a problem I've been having ever

since I moved to Thailand a year ago.

I'll talk about that later in the video.

So I never really noticed that my fingers

or my hands looked weird until maybe the

age of around 11 when my friends started

to make fun of me At school, they used to

say, haha, Daniel's hands look like girl

hands. Daniel's got pink fingernails. Are

you wearing nail varnish? Obviously, I

wasn't wearing nail varnish. For some

reason, my fingernails are just naturally

pink. I don't know why. I used to get so

upset when people said I had girl hands,

so I started to hide my hands a lot. I put

my hands in my pockets all the time. When

I sat at my desk, I always had my fists

clenched. And I got very nervous when I

had to spread out my fingers to grab

something. Sometimes it is quite

beneficial having long fingers. For

example, I can grip things better. I can

wrap my fingers around things like my

phone or a water bottle, but sometimes I

do forget how long they are and I

accidentally knock things over, or I

accidentally touch things that I shouldn't

be touching. When I'm trying to do

cooking, it does kind of get in the way

having long fingers, because when I'm

trying to grip things like the handle of

my knife, which is a very slim object,

my fingers feel like they're too long to

get a good grip on the handle. And also

when I'm chopping vegetables, I feel like

my long fingers kind of get in the way,

so I have to come up with my own unique

way of holding things and chopping things.

Which some might say looks unconventional.

Next, I want to talk about the weird skin

rash and itchiness I have developed

since moving to Thailand about a year ago.

After about a month after I came here, I

started to notice these itchy red rashes

and bumps on my hands, mainly on the

inside of my fingers and my palms. And it

got really bad around November and

December when I was trying to hope that

they would just disappear and heal by

themselves. Unfortunately, they just

wouldn't get better and they were actually

getting much worse. The itchiness got so

bad to the point where I found myself

scratching them in my sleep, and I

scratched up my hands so badly they kind

of got infected and the fingers started to

get all swollen. And at one point I just

completely lost it and I lost any kind of

restraint or willpower and I interlocked

my fingers and I started rubbing

furiously. And as you can imagine, this

made it 10 times worse and my fingers were

just in such a horrible state. I couldn't

even grip stuff or clench my fist because

my fingers were so swollen to the point

that they wouldn't bend anymore. I would

show you pictures of it, but it's so

disgusting I don't want to disgust you too

much. If you follow my Instagram, you

might have seen me post the picture. We

tried lots of different types of creams—

moisturizer, anti-itching,

anti-inflammatory creams— but nothing

really seemed to work until I found this

one type of cream. It's called a topical

corticosteroid, and basically what this

does is it suppresses your immune system

on the area that you apply it to. So I

applied it to my hands and magically it

just healed itself overnight and it was

completely fine and better again. But the

problem is I need to keep applying this

cream every few months now because the

rashes and the itchiness and the little

bumps, they do try to come back,

especially when I'm stressed, they come

back even more. And then when I see the

little bumps starting to form, I know,

okay, I need to apply the cream now

because if I don't, it's gonna just be

that horrible nightmare all over again.

So now I kind of feel like I'm dependent

on topical corticosteroid cream, which I

don't really like because I never really

like to feel like I need a medicine.

And I am aware of the long-term negative

effects of applying topical

corticosteroids to your skin for a long

period of time, but I don't really have

any choice because if I don't apply the

cream, then the rash comes back And it

just makes my life a complete misery

having those rashes. And I have gone to

the doctor, I went to the pharmacist, and

she recommended me topical

corticosteroids. So I don't really know

what else I can do. It is kind of weird

because this only happens when I'm in

Thailand. It went away when I was in

Japan. I've never had this before in my

entire life. I thought maybe I'm allergic

to something, so I tried cutting out

coffee. Which I heard is inflammatory to

the immune system. So I cut out coffee for

like a month. No change. I cut out dairy.

No change. I cut out certain types of

fruit and vegetable like nightshades,

peppers, paprikas, tomatoes. Nothing

really made any difference when I tried to

change my diet. My only guess is maybe the

water here. When I wash my hands or have a

shower, the water here is not safe to

drink. So I don't know what kind of harm

it's doing to my skin. It must be kind of

irritable to my skin other than the water.

Maybe it's the humidity of the hot weather

here. I don't really know. And also it

happened to my sister. Some of you might

know that my sister came to visit me in

Thailand back in May. She was here for

about a week or two, and she also said she

was starting to notice little red itchy

bumps appearing on her hands. And after

she left and went back to the UK, She said

they all disappeared, and I said, that's

exactly what I've got. And I said to her,

maybe if you stayed here for longer, your

hands would have gotten really bad like

mine did. So maybe we share the same kind

of genetics, that's why it's happening to

us. But it seems like for now, topical

corticosteroid cream is the only way to

get rid of it. So yeah, I really hope you

enjoyed listening to my story about my

weird hands. Hope you enjoyed listening to

it as much as I've enjoyed talking to you

about it. And, um, yeah, if you got weird

fingers, fat short fingers, long skinny

fingers, it's okay. Don't worry about it.

Everyone's hands and bodies look

different. You don't all have to look the

same. And if you're wondering why I sound

weird today, it's because I'm still kind

of recovering from being very sick. I had

some kind of influenza. I had fever, high

temperature, a splitting headache for

about 2 or 3 nights, and I just started to

get better, but my voice sounds kind of

weird, and I'm still kind of dizzy and

lightheaded, but I'm okay. Thanks for