One morning in April 1998, I woke up covered in the signs of my first psoriasis flare. I was only 15 years old and a sophomore in high school. Even though my grandma had psoriasis, the spots appeared so suddenly that I thought it was an allergic reaction.
There was no epic trigger, like a stressful situation, illness, or life-changing event. I just woke up covered in red, scaly spots that completely took over my body, causing me intense discomfort, fear, and pain.
对皮肤科医生的访问证实了牛皮癣诊断，并开始了我尝试新药物的旅程，并了解我的疾病。我花了很长时间才真正明白，这是一种疾病，我将永远生活。没有治愈 - 没有魔药或乳液会让斑点消失。
花了几年的时间在阳光下尝试每一个外用。我试过奶油，乳液，凝胶，泡沫和洗发水，甚至将自己包裹在保鲜膜中以保持药物。然后它在每周三次的光处理到一周，并在我把它交给司机的ed之前。
When I told my friends at school, they were very supportive of my diagnosis, and asked a lot of questions to help ensure I felt comfortable. For the most part, my classmates were very kind about it. I think the hardest part about it was the reaction from other parents and adults.
我在曲棍球队中扮演了曲棍球队，有些相对的球队有担忧，我正在玩传染性的东西。我的教练主动与对手的教练谈论它，通常笑着迅速解决。尽管如此，我看到了外表和耳语，想要在棍子后面缩小。
我的皮肤总是对我的身体感到太小了。无论我穿什么，我坐在或撒谎的方式，我在自己的身体中感觉不对。作为一个少年尴尬，没有被红色斑点覆盖。我通过高中和大学信心奋斗。
我非常擅长隐藏在衣服和化妆下的斑点，但我住在长岛。夏天炎热且潮湿，海滩距离酒店仅有20分钟车程。
我可以清楚地记得我第一次与陌生人有关我的皮肤的陌生人的时间。夏天在我的高中大三学年之前，我和一些朋友一起去了海滩。我还在处理我的第一个眩光，我的皮肤非常红色和斑点，但我期待着在我的景点上获得一些阳光并与朋友赶上。
几乎我脱掉了我的海滩掩饰，一个令人难以置信的粗鲁的女人，通过前进来询问我是否有鸡痘或“别的东西传染”如果我冒了一下。
我冻结了，在我可以说什么可以解释之前，她继续向我提供一个令人难以置信的响亮的讲座，了解我是多么不负责任，以及我如何让我周围的每个人都捕捉我的疾病 - 特别是她的幼儿。我被贬低了。抱着眼泪，除了一个微弱的耳语之外，我几乎无法得到任何言语，“我只是有牛皮癣”。
I replay that moment sometimes and think about all the things I should have said to her, but I wasn’t as comfortable with my disease then as I am now. I was still just learning how to live with it.
随着时间的推移和生活进展，我了解更多关于我是谁，我想成为谁。我意识到我的牛皮癣是我是谁，学习与之生活的一部分会让我控制。
我学会了忽略陌生人，熟人或同事的凝视和不敏感的评论。我了解到，大多数人都没有受过教育的牛皮癣是什么，让粗鲁的评论的陌生人不值得我的时间或能量。我学会了如何使我的生活方式适应喇叭口，以及如何穿着它，以便我觉得自信。
I’ve been lucky that there have been years where I can live with clear skin and I am currently controlling my symptoms with a biologic. Even with clear skin, psoriasis is still on my mind daily because it can change quickly. I’ve learned to appreciate the good days and started a blog to share my experience with other young women learning to live with their own psoriasis diagnosis.
So many of my major life events and accomplishments have been made with psoriasis along for the journey — graduations, proms, building a career, falling in love, getting married, and having two beautiful daughters. It took time to build my confidence with psoriasis, but I grew up with it and believe having that diagnosis in part has made me who I am today.
Joni Kazantzis是创造者和博主justagirlwithspots.com屡获殊荣的牛皮癣博客，致力于创造意识，教育疾病，并与牛皮癣分享她的19次以上的个人故事。她的使命是创造一个社区感，并分享可以帮助她读者应对与牛皮癣生活日常挑战的信息。她认为，尽可能多的信息，牛皮癣的人可以赋予他们的最佳生活，并为他们的生活做出正确的治疗选择。