Vitamin A deficiency - bumps on skin??

Been awhile my Crohnies! Hope everyone is doing as well as they can be! After being in remission for almost a year after stopping 6-mp 2 1/2 years in, I flared up in a nasty way in January and landed myself in the hospital. Anyhoot, multiple problems since then, new pain, nausea (never had that with Crohn's), fatigue ...oh yeah, you know the drill ...sigh. There is one thing that is terribly bothering me. I have bumps, almost like ingrown hairs all over my arms and legs! This is so entirely new and I am so embarrassed to even wear shorts, let alone a bathing suit :( I also have an open wound on one calf that will not heal from about 3 weeks ago. Well, a friend suggested I may have a vitamin A deficiency. Has anyone had experience with this? If that is the cause, what is the best way to speed up recovery? Of course all those bumps are there so I scratch and pick, I look like a total freak show right now :'(

Another question, anyone on immune suppressants ever been exposed to anyone with mono/EBV virus? I have been so sick since January. Pill cam did find a few small ulcerations but nothing that should be making me this ill, so says the GI. What are my chances of catching it? I fear every cough and sneeze, I had awful luck on 6mp. UTI's, fungal infections, salmonella for 9 months ...I am worried. I went in for a test Thursday so, hopefully I will have my results next week. This girls mom swears none of us can catch it but, with my track record I do have concerns.

Thanks for your time everyone! Sending lots of positive thoughts your way :)

I have had Chrones Disease for almost 7 years now and I have been in and out of the hospitals so much that I am always scared I am going to catch somethin. Lately I have had these bumps on my legs that are really big and red. One day i could hardly even walk because my legs were so swullen and it felt like my legs were each 100 pounds. I went to the doctor and they had a special name for it, which for the life of me I cant remember, but they said it is from my Chrones. They said that Chrones can affect your eyes, joints, muscles and skin. They admitted me into the hospital because they were worried about my malnutrition so they told me to talk ibprofine to help with the swelling, which took awhile to take the swelling totally away but it did help. They also put me on TPN which I hook up myself every night to my PICC Line. Everytime that I am on this, I feel like a million dollars. Have you ever been on TPN before? Also recently I have been having difficulty with my eyes, They feel like they are going to pop out of my head so on Monday I have to go to the eye doctor just to make sure I dont have glaucoma, which also can happen to Chrones patients from taking to much prednisone.

So what I am trying to get at is try taking some ibprofin, my doctor told me to talk 800 mgs every 6 hours, so pretty much just take a OTC ibprofin 200mgs and just take 4 of them. Ibprofine always helps with inflamation. It also helped with my fevers that I was getting. I hope this information helps you and when I see my doctor again on Monday, I will get the correct word for the lumps on the legs!

JRaeSeidl

Thanks everyone. I also looked at that Keratosis pilaris. It's not as severe as some of the pictures I have seen but, since they have spread to the tops of my feet and and my hands, I am concerned :/ I have an appointment with my GI next month so, I will mention it then. Another day in the life of having Crohn's!

My daughter has keratosis pilaris - not much can be done about it. Food-based vitamin A is the safest way to supplement - carrots are good. Boiled and slathered with butter is good - the fat helps the body to absorb vitamin A.  

Here's more info about food sources of A:

http://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/vitamina/

Don't take Vitamin A supplements - oddly, they have been found to cause worse bone density issues. Betacarotene supplements are better, but food- based A is best.