repair drywall in the shower

Question

How do I repair a moisture damaged drywall in my shower?

This is a painted wall, and the paint is gone in some areas and the spots that have no paint get soaked when I use the shower. In these areas the wall is not flat, there are cavities where there is no paint.

I have found a few similar questions on this site, the answers recommend tiles, etc, I would prefer to leave it painted, and not reinstall this section of the wall. So I do not want to cut out this section and install cement board. I just want to waterproof it, fill in the cavities, and paint.

I have no idea what materials to use, how to waterproof it, etc. I have never done it. Please help.

EDIT: this is around the plastic shower stall, you can see the side of the tub in the left part of the photo.

Answer 1

The best thing you could do is to put ceramic tiles but since that's not what you want let’s try to think of something else. Firstly you must replace damaged drywall. It is extra sensitive when it comes to moisture or water. You can, and should replace it with moisture resistant drywall which is normally used in bathrooms. Then you should apply some waterproofing layer; something cement based (something like Sikalastic-200 W).But thing that is worrying me is do you have horizontal waterproofing layer (waterproofing on your floor? I'm asking this because horizontal and vertical waterproofing layer should be continuous. Than you can pain the bathroom with some exterior (façade) material which is impermeable to water or you can use something like travertine technique which is more expensive but looks really nice and it’s waterproof.