A funny story here. My daughter is a competitive gymnast and a pretty good one I might say :-) In the past she's used lanolin on the rips on her hands she gets from doing bars. I told her that Udder Balm would be a very good cheaper replacement. She looked at me like I was nuts and told me her coach recommended Hand E Balm. My wife did some research and found out some dad years ago didn't like the idea of his little gymnast using a product for cows and took it to a chemist. The chemist identified the non FDA approved ingredients, removed them and they made Hand E Balm. My daughter won't touch my "cow butter" as she calls it, but has no problem using a $3.00 a 2 oz. tube of her gymnast balm. I jut shake my head and laugh it off. I think it's 100% peer pressure. If her teammates found out, it wouldn't be pretty. randy

This may or may not be helpful, but I had a lot of trouble finding creams or lotions that worked after a few applications and discovered I was allergic to something in many of them. It's not a serious allergy that would be obvious to anyone right away, just a matter of feeling like I need more and more for less and less effect. To make matters more complicated the ingredient I was tested as allergic to (it's called Balsam of Peru!) is not listed on the label and is in many cosmetics and cleaning products. If that's your problem I wish you luck! If I find a soap or shampoo or whatever I use it until they 'improve' it and I can't use it any more. Used to love to experiment and try new products!

Ruthieg...I can't answer for Michelle...but I can tell you that I, personally, wasted large sums of money trying every lotion/cream/salve that was recommended by a pharmacist and/or dermatologist. The insidious thing about eczema and psoriasis is that not everything works for everybody and recommendations from real live sufferers are my best sources for tried and true products so I return the informational kindness forward when I'm able. This is a wonderfully helpful forum for those in need of actual experience info and I, for one, hope it continues to be for those in need. Anne

thank you terri and cajungardener, thats exactly the information i was looking for. i want to do a healing product with infused oil (calendula, comfrey and other herbs) but not sure whether to do it as a salve or lotion bar, now i know :) another question for cajungardener, when you infuse your herbs in oil for salve, do you do them individually or just mixed individually infused oil? i am thinking of infusing the herbs together to make this salve unless there is disadvantage to it. if i do it separately, i will probably end up with a significant amount of oil ... i am planning on using olive oil (promace grade) to infuse herbs with for its long shelf life, are there better options? thanks, kay