Annmarie's Story

On the run up to Psoriasis Awareness Week, where our theme is 'Age,' we hear from Annemarie who has shared her story previously. This time, she talks about what it was like to grow up living with psoriasis.

School was hard especially PE as I couldn't do swimming or felt at the time, not confident to show my arms and legs in any sports as kids would stare make fun of me which made me feel worse and hide away.

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I once had a customer at a previous job that was rude and upset me by not wanting to be served by me while on the food counter, saying I am contagious when my reply at time was "If I was contagious I'd not be on this counter or in store working."

That made me feel sad that the customer said this to me and that some people don't understand what psoriasis is and should ask people before judging.

During puberty it was not good as it was sore under my boob's and lady area which made it difficult wearing bras and hurt in lady area which wasn't good during intimacy.

I'm now on biologic injections after other medication not working. I've been on it nearly three months and I'm in shock at how my psoriasis has cleared up so quickly. Yes, I've still got patches but not as bad as it was on legs or arms or back as you see from the pictures.

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I feel a lot more confident in myself with not covering up and hope this helps others and highlights how it can affect you with nasty comments and stares when others don't understand daily struggles we have to go through. It's not just a skin condition it takes over your life day in day out.