While many people living with psoriasis don’t develop symptoms until later in life, some — like Sarah Ciuffetelli — begin dealing with the disease in early childhood, and learning to cope can take quite a bit of time. Psoriasis is a hereditary chronic skin condition that can cause red, itchy patches to develop on various parts of the body. The symptoms associated with the disease can be uncomfortable and, sometimes, embarrassing.
Unfortunately, there is no cure and while there are
many treatments available to help people living with psoriasis when they have flare-ups, coping with the social and emotional side effects of the disease can be really difficult as well.
Sarah’s mother has severe psoriasis, so it wasn’t a shock to her parents when she was diagnosed at three years old. Of course at that age, Sarah herself was unaware and as a result she didn’t know what it was like to have normal skin. In Sarah’s case, learning to cope involved learning to deal with the shame associated with psoriasis. “One thing I remember in high school is being very, very socially aware of it,” she explains. “Dating would come into mind. Because of my particular psoriasis, most of the time [the patches appeared] on my torso. It was a lot of stress.”
She explains that it took her years to feel comfortable in her own skin — and it involved quite a bit of changing her mode of thinking. For Sarah, this included sharing her story with others who could relate, and even be inspired by her struggle.
“I really started my healing, my mental healing journey, with psoriasis when I opened my Instagram account. I know that sounds really funny, but it was a secret account. No one knew it was me, my face didn’t appear … It was a way of me showing the world what I looked like without actually revealing who I was,” Sarah explains. “Through that, I was getting lots of positive comments, lots of people thanking me for sharing it and being so open about it.”
Through sharing her story, Sarah says she eventually learned to feel comfortable in her own skin. There’s a special strength in learning to be vulnerable.
Check out SurvivorNet’s
resources for people living with psoriasis here.
