Psoriasis is a part of my life including a bunch of other health conditions. It rarely crosses my mind, I treat it and get on with my day. However, I occasionally come across things online about psoriasis and see people who do not understand the condition talk very negatively and inconsiderately about it. I also get eczema every so often but no-one seems to talk badly about it like psoriasis, nor do I feel embarrassed to mention I have eczema like I do with psoriasis. So I wanted to share some information about what psoriasis is, what the common misconceptions are and how I manage the condition!
What is psoriasis?
Psoriasis is an autoimmune disease. It is a chronic disease affecting 2% of people in the UK and 7.5 million people in the US. It causes an excess of skin production due to the immune system attacking healthy skin cells. In a healthy person, skin cells are replaced every 3-4 weeks, but in someone with psoriasis, this process happens every 3-7 days! It varies in severity from person to person - some get patches here and there, others have the condition on most of their body and it can affect their quality of life. You can have periods of remission and other times things like stress can cause it to flare up and get worse. It can make your skin feel itchy and eventually lead to soreness and treating the condition can be a very painful process! People with psoriasis are more likely to develop ulcerative colitis, Crohn's disease, lymphoma, diabetes, heart disease, metabolic syndrome and more. It can also increase the risk of depression and suicide. Below are some of the misconceptions about psoriasis:
1: It's contagious!
This is the most prominent misconception. It's a condition caused by the immune system not working properly and is often genetic. It cannot be passed onto someone through skin to skin contact.
2: It's due to poor hygiene
And this is the second most prominent misconception. As in my case, I have scalp psoriasis which can occasionally make it look like I have dandruff, sometimes a lot of it if it's exceptionally bad. However, I wash my hair just as much, if not more than the next person and as it's an autoimmune disease, it has nothing to do with poor hygiene.
3: It only affects the skin
Psoriasis usually affects the skin, but it can affect other parts of the body, including the nails. Fourty percent of people with psoriasis may also develop psoriatic arthritis which can cause painful joints, swelling and stiffness and is again caused by the immune system attacking healthy tissue.
4: It is curable
There is currently no cure for psoriasis
5: It isn't treatable
There are a variety of treatments available to keep the condition under control.
My experience of psoriasis and how I manage it
I can't specifically remember being diagnosed with psoriasis, but my mum has the condition and was getting treatment before she recognised symptoms in myself. However, what I do remember is the first time I received treatment for it. I had no idea how severe and how sore my skin was on my scalp until I applied a topical treatment (almost like a bottle of water that you spread over your scalp). It felt like someone had poured acid on my skin and the pain was so horrendous, I had to scream into a pillow! My mother had to do small sections at a time and each inch of my skin that came into contact with the solution burned. Unsurprisingly, I wasn't looking forward to my next dose and it again burned my skin like acid, just like the first time. Thankfully, after those two terrible experiences, it no longer causes me pain as I have been using the topical treatment for many years now and it is under much better control. Unfortunately, a couple of years ago, my psoriasis spread to my ears and almost every time I treat my ears, it stings like crazy and I have to take my time with it.
It felt like someone had poured acid on my skin and the pain was so horrendous, I had to scream into a pillow!
I also have a medicated shampoo which contains coal tar! I am not sure how it works and it smells very weird, but it's a second medication I use regularly to control my psoriasis. If I leave it on my head in the shower (which you're meant to do for about 7 minutes), it sometimes tingles so it must be doing something! I wash my hair every other day, so if I wash my hair on Monday, it'll be washed on Wednesday. How often you wash your hair doesn't really make a difference to psoriasis, but if I were to wait until Thursday, my hair would feel greasy and my scalp would feel itchy and generally uncomfortable so I never go more than two days if I can! Sometimes if the psoriasis is in remission, I could last a bit longer between washes if I wanted to, but that rarely happens.
As mentioned in the beginning, I don't really think about my psoriasis but every so often, if I am going through a period of stress, it flares up and becomes more prominent. At the moment, I would say it is flaring up because I have been going through some stress recently and I can't fully explain the feeling, but I can feel the psoriasis and it feels generally uncomfortable. I avoid scratching as it makes it worse and makes the skin sore which is what makes the treatment feel like it's burning my skin. Basically, I feel like I need to wash and treat my scalp right now like it was a 'Thursday' or even a Friday, but I washed my hair yesterday. Psoriasis can also make dying my hair a painful experience and is probably not recommended, though I find hair dyes with no ammonia in, hurt less, if at all.
Having psoriasis can be quite embarrassing at times. I am happy to share with people my other health conditions but for some reason, psoriasis is one that never gets mentioned, either because I forget about it because it's in remission or genuinely because I feel they would judge me. For a long time, I was embarrassed to go to a hairdresser because they might judge me for having any dandruff (even though I very rarely develop dandruff now) or think I'm contagious. It is difficult to find an understanding hairdresser. Sometimes I can't wear a black top the day after washing my hair and have my hair down because there will be some dandruff there at some point. I once took my hair down in front of an ex boyfriend and I had so much dandruff come out, it looked like it was snowing - I was mortified!
It can get tiring having to keep on top of a chronic condition, never knowing when it'll act up and continuously treating it but with no cure in sight. I have a few other chronic conditions which I have to take care of and one episode of stress can cause everything to become unbalanced and then I feel miserable. Sometimes it feels like a part time job having to organise my medications and doctors appointments!
Having any noticeable health condition can be embarrassing, but what makes it even more embarrassing is when people, who don't understand the condition, perpetuate false information and make people feel ashamed for having something they have no control over! I hope this myTake contributes to the reduction of ignorance towards the condition and increases support and understanding for those who have to manage psoriasis every day.
Sources:
https://www.healthywomen.org/content/blog-entry/9-common-misconceptions-about-psoriasis
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