A Little Bit About Oral Lichen Planus (Since Apparently Wherever You Look, There is Only a Little Bit About It)

Disclaimer: This is not medical advice. Simply what I continue to go through. As with all auto immune diseases, we are going to carve out our own paths.

Guys, I am no doctor. I just wanted to take you through the motions of dealing with this, once I learnt this was a premalignant bla bla bla … DON’T be scared. You got this. In my understanding Oral Lichen Planus is a lifestyle inflicted condition, and much can be done.

I’ve had this condition for the past five years or so, honestly I couldn’t tell you – it could even be a bit longer than that because it’s only been a few months since I really figured what was it that hurt me in my mouth whenever I would eat anything hot or spicy, but in my case, particularly acid-based – so you’re looking at the citrus stuff, all manner of vinegar sauces, including Frank’s hot sauce :-(… And of course the Wal-Mart chili that you get at Pei-Wei.

In the past, it will come and go away as Lichen Planus is supposed to, and being the extreme acid aficionado that I’ve known myself to be for decades, and the acute milk drinker and dairy product eater (though these are different times), I would just always assume the acid in the chili and the spices have managed to inflict another wound in my mucosa. And then I would marginally cut down upon the acidity in my food, and as the wound would feel like it’s healing, I will start to feel better and forget about it entirely.

On and on would this continue, with a wide variety of feelings and sensations, but to me it all meant still being in control. After all, it was my diet and my choice of fast food, and I could get my mouth back in perfect shape if I started skipping on the Hot and Fire Taco Bell sauce packets, and the ilk.

Feb 2019

Thank goodness I happened to be outside the United States at the time, because when the first dentist I saw in relation to this – the nicest guy ever – who also told me this was a premalignant condition, and it had nothing to do with any kind of oral injury or how spicy the food may have been, it was as if the ground beneath my feet had been pulled. He directed me to an oral pathologist (and that was the first time I learned about their existence).

The ene.media lesson in all of this is that what ever you hold the closest to your life is likely going to kill you. Swimmers will often drown, seeking confidence in situations where you and me would not go with fins, and the person fascinated with storms is most likely to be blown away in one of his ordinary workplace situations. You live by the sword, expect to die by it …

There were a few different remedies that perhaps the best oral pathologist I could have found (SO LUCKY – plus I used a local app that rates doctors) suggested to me (she cost me about $5):

Of course that the steroid cream could be liberally applied upon the affected area in the mouth. I reckon a number of unsuspecting people would immediately start doing so – after all, its a cream, and secondly, the doctor told them to do so. Owing to my exposure to therapy, and a culture of looking at the underlying causes behind diseases, I was able to resist the temptation of squeezing the $1 tube in my mouth, even though at the time I sought help, my OLP was more aggravated than perhaps ever. I could never really figure if it was a tiny dot like structure, perhaps a canker sore near my area that was bleeding, or if it was actually OLP (the more aggravated instance of Oral Lichen Planus can cause bleeding).

I was raised in a culture of informational chauvinism, with an underlying theme of information superiority. That allowed me to be as skeptical as I found myself about all of the advice that the best doctor that I could find was giving me at this time. Oh and I would let this be known at this time that up until then I had abused my mouth nicely. I was consuming Frank’s hot sauce and many many other less tasty varieties by the quart, every so often, and that would also be the packaging that I would find most logical for my needs and usage.

I would only ever eat hot and sour foods, and given my notions of information superiority, refused to use a toothpaste – sometimes justifying not even brushing (because our ancestors never did and for that matter, Id later realize why they lost mostly all their teeth by age 35). Instead, I would do coconut oil pulling, and sometimes not even that. Besides, I hated – I hated hated hated the smell of toothpaste. So I was having a moment of reckoning.

Then the doctor recommended, my sweet sweet Dr., that I do Listerine gargles, and that was something that I would do in the past thinking that I do have an actual cut and that the alcohol would be a suitable disinfectant.

She would tell me to eat food devoid of spices and oil. TO BE CONTINUED …

UPDATE: End Sep, 2020

1. Over the past 9 months or so, I havent had OLP on the top of my mind at all.
2. Ive been eating in balance and STAYING AWAY from vinegar entirely. Compare that to what the norm was.
3. Slightly more physical activity and cosncious eating and a lack of consciousness about OLP entirely has meant that Ive hada flareup I think once every 3 months.
4. Intensity also down – much lower intensity.
5. In anyc ase I dont think this is going to cancer stage – thats how I think.
6. That reinforces the positive loop.
7. Less thinking – better results.
8. SO:: try and move on if you can. If you have reason to.
9. I am only updating because I saw this post today 🙂
10. I wish you ALL similar results.
11. My Oral Path agreed: eat GOOD – dont abuse your sense of tase; BURN that food; and keep moving.