Hi.
Any lip balm or moisture seems to initiate the problem. That and the deterioration of the inside membrane of your lips from tooth paste and mouth wash. It(EC) obviously also favours larger more exposed lips.

Firstly the lip balm you begin using because you think it will moisten your lips to avoid chapping. I think that by using the lip balm and always having your lips moist (like if you sit in a bath for so long.. your skin becomes water logged).. the moist outer layers of your lips lose their structural rigidity, their tensile strength to hold the lips and the skin in its natural state. Over time, with the continual use of the balms, further reduces that structural, outer layer of lip skin, causing them to become more everted (fatter, plumper and outward shaped). That increase in size and the changes to the external skin both structurally as a functioning layer holding your lips in their natural state, and as soft natural skin is deteriorated. So they become everted and areas that were once inside the mouth are increasingly outside the mouth where the membrane is not meant to be, causing drying, slothing(white stuff in contact with water) and inflammation.

The inflamed membrane is then succeptable to more substances especially harsh chemicals in toothpastes and mouth wash.

I definitely think the toothpaste and mouth wash are a massive cause of this problem. Get some Grants toothpaste, or sensadine ProEnemal from coles or Woollies. throw away your colgate and any type of mouth wash.

Understand that the skin is not just there to be soft, its also there to be structural holding the lips in their natural position. If that skin tension and connection is disturbed by continual moisture then all the dynamics of the lips change as a result.

regards.