Soy Sauce In My First Aid Kit!

Recently, I burnt my wrist with steam while opening the lid of a boiling pot. I'm not the type that fusses over small kitchen accidents, like hot splatters of oil on the hands or accidentally touching something out of the oven with my barehands ( Yep-you could say I am accident proned!) I think of myself as a Ruff-N-Tuff kinda gal - I don't usually bother with band-aids or antiseptic cream or even medication most of the time. But this time it hurt like hell. Instead of treating the wound I complained to my husband, who told me to at least rinse it under cold water. OK, I thought I should at least do that! But it continued to sting like crazy!

My skin was already quite red by then and hubby got worried. He said that I should quickly pour thick dark soy sauce over it if I had some. My first thought was "That's absolutely ridiculous!" Filled with complete doubt, I asked him three times "Are you SURE?" It sounded like an insane and nonsensical idea but he assured me that was what his mother taught him! Before I could give it any further thought, he was pouring that thick, gluggy, black condiment all over my hands. Spa treatment this is not! He coated every bit of my hand and not knowing how to deal with it I just stood there with my hand over the kitchen sink, black soy sauce dripping. The stinging continued. No way this is working, I thought. We were planning to go to the gym, and I wasn't sure what to do with the sauce on my hands-whether to bandage it up or rinse it off. After "marinading" my hand for about 25 minutes, I decided to just rinse it off and head to the gym. That was the last I paid any attention to that burn. The redness remained for a few days.

During my last visit to my TCM doctor, I asked him what I should do in the future if I had scalded my hands with hot water or steam. The first thing he said was pour thick soy sauce over it. My husband and I looked at each other and laughed! I couldn't believe that a doctor had seconded this Old Wive's Myth! Then I told him what happened and showed him my burn. It was still a bit red but was starting to turn a light brown. He said that it was healing well, and that if I hadn't done that, the burn would have blistered and the skin would have broken and bled. He did tell me that I should not have rinsed it with water but poured the soy sauce immediately over it instead, and then leave it on the whole day or for at least 30 minutes. And he said to cut fresh aloe vera and apply it over the burn so that it would heal better. Truthfully, I have not bothered with that or any lotions. I still don't know for sure if that soy sauce made any difference, but now my burn has left a very thin layer of brownish skin that has already started to come off, as you can see in the photo. I am sure that if I exfoliated the dead skin away, there would be very little sign of the burn. So who knows, it might be a good idea to have thick dark soy sauce in your First Aid Kit!