He tried to get a smooth chin — and got anything but.
A California man redefined “razor rash” after a shaver mixup resulted in his face getting ravaged by flesh-eating bacteria. His disfiguring fiasco first came to light in April via a series of viral TikTok videos, but the poor soul hadn’t divulged the full story until now.
“I got these deep pustules and sores on my chin and along my jawline,” Nick Holterman, 24, told Jam Press of the infection, which began innocuously after he used his housemate’s razor to shear off some unsightly stubble on his chin and cheeks.
A few days later, the Los Angeles native started to suffer from a “really bad upper respiratory infection” while his chin broke out in bumps that resembled “spider bites.”
Holterman immediately rushed to see his general practitioner, who prescribed him a round of antibiotics. Unfortunately, the drugs had no effect, and the personal assistant’s condition began to deteriorate further, with the bumps lingering for several weeks.
When his sores “ballooned in size,” the bedraggled beard trimmer made a second trip to the doctor, who tested him for everything from COVID to strep throat. The results came back negative, whereupon the medical practitioner diagnosed him with impetigo, a highly contagious skin infection, which was “caused by either an antibiotic-resistant staph [bacteria infection] or an antibiotic-resistant strep,” Holterman told Jam Press.
While generally not dangerous, impetigo can cause kidney damage and even potentially life-threatening cellulitis if left untreated, according to the Mayo Clinic.
Holterman was subsequently prescribed Bactrim, a combination of two antibiotics, which cleared up the infection — despite making him super nauseous.
“I felt like I was going to throw up constantly for a week because my body’s natural bacteria and gut flora was being ravaged by three different antibiotics,” said Holterman of the veritable microbe MOAB. “I had to eat a lot of yogurt to regain those probiotics.”
Despite almost losing face, the besieged shaver doesn’t blame his roommate for the cosmetic catastrophe.
“I can’t really remember if the razor was actually dirty or if it was clean and my roommate’s skin flora is just different to mine,” said Holterman. “But I’ll just say the razor was dirty, because I would never slander his character like that.”
He even posted a TikTok PSA in April warning others not to make the same mistake.
“Just want to remind anyone not to share razors or use random people’s razors. You can get an antibiotic-resistant flesh-eating bacteria that is extremely painful and oozes pus all the time,” warned Holterman in the video, which currently boasts almost 10 million views on TikTok.
The shaving-accident survivor, who sports a chin bandage in the clip, added that the “antibiotics will make you constipated for two weeks, and if they don’t work you will die.”
Holterman had uploaded his cautionary tale in response to another TikToker who described shaving her bestie’s nether regions with a frat guy’s razor to prep her for hanky-panky.
This isn’t the first time a seemingly harmless decision has resulted in a serious condition.
In 2019, a German man shockingly died from the complications of a bacterial infection he had contracted from kissing his dog.