Hey all! I’m so thankful for this thread because I know I’m not alone. Several doctors have no clue what’s happening. My orange stain started as streaks mid January and have continued on re-appearing 2-3x a week and “retreat” or lighten every few days before emerging again overnight. The pattern and intensity varies but it’s always on my right hand and starts in the “webbing” between my thumb and pointer finger. At one point it looked like it was dripping all the way down my forearm. Also, on one of the worst days, basically my whole thumb was orange (photo below) and it smells exactly like tanning cream! Like a burnt sugar smell. To echo many people on this thread, no I do not use tanning cream or use anything that would cause a stain. I don’t sleep walk. There are no stains in my bed or anywhere else on my body. I don’t use any creams or serums with vitamin c, no prescription drugs, no diet changes, no medication or supplement changes. It’s like it came out of nowhere. I had blood work done and results were nothing out of the ordinary except my vitamin D was really low.
The only thing I can think of is that I did touch a pine tree while I was foraging some pine needles a few days to a week (can’t recall time frame for sure) before it first appeared and maybe it’s fungal or something from the tree? But does fungus come and go like this?
I’ve looked at photos of tinea versicolor and other tinea fungal infections and it doesn’t look like what I’m experiencing.
I’m meeting with a rheumatologist in a few days so we will see if it’s autoimmune related. I’ll post any updates here.