So I've had Staph infections for 8ish months now.

This is a long post so I'm going to split it into two sections. The first half is my experience with Staph and the second half will be what worked for me and didn't work for me.

Part 1: My story

It all started as a mosquito bite that I naively went to the gym without covering and I picked up a strain of Staph Aureus on my bicep.

I went on antibiotics and then three days later it came back in a different spot on the same arm and I repeated that cycle for a month or two.

My infection presented as boils, usually weeping but eventually I got one that wouldn't drain.

It became an abscess and I had to go to Emergency to get an Incision and Drainage surgery.

The healing from that was miserable and took many weeks as it was partially stitched and partially open requiring packing.

I got a little smarter and started a decolonisation and got all my hygiene and diet in order. I did a bunch of research and got a dermatologist appointment (5 month wait lmao).

Despite my efforts it came back again and again and I kept researching new ways to fend it off. I feel like I tried everything but eventually I would always have to make a choice between antibiotics and surgery

and I always chose antibiotics.

Then about 3 months ago I had done a run of antibiotics followed by a decolonisation + sanitized my whole house.

And I had a shift. My infection had changed from a few large boils to folliculitis. Dozens of small spots all over my body.

That went on for a while, I pretty much cured it by using hand sanitizer on it twice a day lol (I dont recommend it but it worked) and then I had my dermatologist appointment.

They had nothing to look at by that point and pretty much told me to use cleanser and moisturizer + do some bleach baths and sent me on my way.

And everything was good for a while.

But then I got a perianal abscess. I immediately panicked because your butthole is the last place you want an infection and my doctor insisted it had come from the inside of my anal glands and was assuming it was completely unrelated to the staph.

Anyway I went into surgery, it was surprisingly painless and easy but when they tested it. It was in fact the same strain of staph. I'm not convinced it came from the inside but it was confusing how it was instantly an abscess, no weeping wound, just a red lump with a lot of pressure. I got it out early so I never got the extreme pain these can cause.

And then the next week I got another lump, near my butthole but technically they considered it buttocks not perianal.

In any case I panicked and thought maybe it was a fistula, which means infection spreading through your anal glands so I immediately went back to hospital and they cut it out. I followed that procedure up with antibiotics. There was no fistula, and it seems like just another staph boil.

3 weeks have passed since then and I have a new spot but I think it wont require surgery as its more on the butt cheek meaning I can treat it at home and It's improving now with the help of drawing salve and no antibiotics. Although ofc I'm keeping a close eye on it.

I think that these were normal staph infections rather than a genuine anal gland infection, I have somewhat complicated reasoning for this but its beyond the scope of this post.

I've been told I may have Hidradenitis Superitiva but I'm not sure. I might find out at the dermatologist in a few days although I suspect that it doesn't really matter if I do or don't as my options as far as treatment goes don't really change.

Part 2: What Ive learned

One thing I've noticed is that when I get boils, they usually come one after the other in one section of skin at a time, first it was my bicep, now I've had a bunch in my butt crack.

Of course you could have multiple sections of skin infected at once but the important thing to realise is that it's not just the pustule itself that's infected, it's the whole sub layer beneath that section of skin.

I've had a change in philosophy when it comes to staph lately because originally I had this idea that it was just a bad bacteria and if I could kill it all then I would be free.

But what I'm realising is that this bacteria is everywhere and the idea of killing it all is fantasy.

Killing the staph works for many people because it reduces the bacterial load on the body which allows your immune system to finish the job but for a lot of people this doesnt cure it. Especially people compromised skin barriers due to eczema or other skin conditions.

I believe that this is because our compromised skin barrier allows the staph to live safely beneath our skins surface. Your skin protects it from soap and it can set up cell walls against your immune system and antibiotics.

Not only that but I think my efforts to kill it using chlorhexidine and other anti bacterial creams have been killing skin cells and healthy bacteria which clogs the pores, provides food for the staph and eliminates healthy bacteria allowing for the opportunistic staph to overgrow.

I dont think topical treatments work on staph directly I think you need to use topical treatments to strengthen your skin in spite of the staph.

So I've changed my mindset, no more chlorhexidine and mupirocin. Or at least a significantly reduced amount.

Here is what I'm doing now (I will update to let yall know if it works)

So this is my prevention routine, I use these products on problem areas. (Anywhere I see redness or have had recent infections)

Every day I use a cleanser with salicylic acid,

benzoyl peroxide

and a moisturizer.

Specifically I'm using CeraVe SA Smoothing Cleanser (in the shower) then dry off and use Benzac Benzoyl Peroxide 5% and then CeraVe SA Smoothing Cream.

And then on my last existing boil I am using a drawing salve called Magnoplasm which uses dried magnesium sulfate which is a new thing I'm trying and is the only thing I've ever found that really opens up a stubborn boil and drains it without antibiotics. (Hot compresses work but not as well)

I take daily probiotics, zinc, fish oil and I will be adding vitamin D

A couple times a week I will do a bleach bath.

I will talk to my dermatologist about all of this in a few days, I've switched to a different dermatologist that specializes in infections

Also shout out to Bacillus Subtilis MB40 I had extremely high hopes for it but it didn't work for me, Ive used it orally for 4 months now.

I made my own lotion with it as well and this did help for a while but ultimately I continued having issues after using it consistently. And when I started getting folliculitis the oiliness actively made it worse.

So I've had Staph infections for 8ish months now.

This is a long post so I'm going to split it into two sections. The first half is my experience with Staph and the second half will be what worked for me and didn't work for me.

Part 1: My story

It all started as a mosquito bite that I naively went to the gym without covering and I picked up a strain of Staph Aureus on my bicep.

I went on antibiotics and then three days later it came back in a different spot on the same arm and I repeated that cycle for a month or two.

My infection presented as boils, usually weeping but eventually I got one that wouldn't drain.

It became an abscess and I had to go to Emergency to get an Incision and Drainage surgery.

The healing from that was miserable and took many weeks as it was partially stitched and partially open requiring packing.

I got a little smarter and started a decolonisation and got all my hygiene and diet in order. I did a bunch of research and got a dermatologist appointment (5 month wait lmao).

Despite my efforts it came back again and again and I kept researching new ways to fend it off. I feel like I tried everything but eventually I would always have to make a choice between antibiotics and surgery

and I always chose antibiotics.

Then about 3 months ago I had done a run of antibiotics followed by a decolonisation + sanitized my whole house.

And I had a shift. My infection had changed from a few large boils to folliculitis. Dozens of small spots all over my body.

That went on for a while, I pretty much cured it by using hand sanitizer on it twice a day lol (I dont recommend it but it worked) and then I had my dermatologist appointment.

They had nothing to look at by that point and pretty much told me to use cleanser and moisturizer + do some bleach baths and sent me on my way.

And everything was good for a while.

But then I got a perianal abscess. I immediately panicked because your butthole is the last place you want an infection and my doctor insisted it had come from the inside of my anal glands and was assuming it was completely unrelated to the staph.

Anyway I went into surgery, it was surprisingly painless and easy but when they tested it. It was in fact the same strain of staph. I'm not convinced it came from the inside but it was confusing how it was instantly an abscess, no weeping wound, just a red lump with a lot of pressure. I got it out early so I never got the extreme pain these can cause.

And then the next week I got another lump, near my butthole but technically they considered it buttocks not perianal.

In any case I panicked and thought maybe it was a fistula, which means infection spreading through your anal glands so I immediately went back to hospital and they cut it out. I followed that procedure up with antibiotics. There was no fistula, and it seems like just another staph boil.

3 weeks have passed since then and I have a new spot but I think it wont require surgery as its more on the butt cheek meaning I can treat it at home and It's improving now with the help of drawing salve and no antibiotics. Although ofc I'm keeping a close eye on it.

I think that these were normal staph infections rather than a genuine anal gland infection, I have somewhat complicated reasoning for this but its beyond the scope of this post.

I've been told I may have Hidradenitis Superitiva but I'm not sure. I might find out at the dermatologist in a few days although I suspect that it doesn't really matter if I do or don't as my options as far as treatment goes don't really change.

Part 2: What Ive learned

One thing I've noticed is that when I get boils, they usually come one after the other in one section of skin at a time, first it was my bicep, now I've had a bunch in my butt crack.

Of course you could have multiple sections of skin infected at once but the important thing to realise is that it's not just the pustule itself that's infected, it's the whole sub layer beneath that section of skin.

I've had a change in philosophy when it comes to staph lately because originally I had this idea that it was just a bad bacteria and if I could kill it all then I would be free.

But what I'm realising is that this bacteria is everywhere and the idea of killing it all is fantasy.

Killing the staph works for many people because it reduces the bacterial load on the body which allows your immune system to finish the job but for a lot of people this doesnt cure it. Especially people compromised skin barriers due to eczema or other skin conditions.

I believe that this is because our compromised skin barrier allows the staph to live safely beneath our skins surface. Your skin protects it from soap and it can set up cell walls against your immune system and antibiotics.

Not only that but I think my efforts to kill it using chlorhexidine and other anti bacterial creams have been killing skin cells and healthy bacteria which clogs the pores, provides food for the staph and eliminates healthy bacteria allowing for the opportunistic staph to overgrow.

I dont think topical treatments work on staph directly I think you need to use topical treatments to strengthen your skin in spite of the staph.

So I've changed my mindset, no more chlorhexidine and mupirocin. Or at least a significantly reduced amount.

Here is what I'm doing now (I will update to let yall know if it works)

So this is my prevention routine, I use these products on problem areas. (Anywhere I see redness or have had recent infections)

Every day I use a cleanser with salicylic acid,

benzoyl peroxide

and a moisturizer.

Specifically I'm using CeraVe SA Smoothing Cleanser (in the shower) then dry off and use Benzac Benzoyl Peroxide 5% and then CeraVe SA Smoothing Cream.

And then on my last existing boil I am using a drawing salve called Magnoplasm which uses dried magnesium sulfate which is a new thing I'm trying and is the only thing I've ever found that really opens up a stubborn boil and drains it without antibiotics. (Hot compresses work but not as well)

I take daily probiotics, zinc, fish oil and I will be adding vitamin D

A couple times a week I will do a bleach bath.

I will talk to my dermatologist about all of this in a few days, I've switched to a different dermatologist that specializes in infections

Also shout out to Bacillus Subtilis MB40 I had extremely high hopes for it but it didn't work for me, Ive used it orally for 4 months now.

I made my own lotion with it as well and this did help for a while but ultimately I continued having issues after using it consistently. And when I started getting folliculitis the oiliness actively made it worse.