Friday, April 19, 2002

On a Personal Note

I have been debating for the good part of a few years on whether or not to disclose the fact that I have psoriasis. Short of starting an all out campaign to inform the Voodoo Public, I'll just lay it all out on the line here. I think it's high time that I spill my guts on the matter, and maybe help some of you understand certain peculiarities that I possess. That and this year marks the 20 year that I've been diagnosed.

I am not going to get into the physiological details. It's painful enough to have to sit still knowing that you have a crawling itch that is totally unbearable. What's even more painful is the reaction from others, ranging from "Do you have a rash" to "What the fuck is wrong with you?" I kid you not. People are not kind. I deal with points, stares, carefully guarded whispers, and sometimes outright blabbing always within earshot, and never edited for the public. This makes it hard to be myself, preferring the indoors to the outdoors, wearing long sleeves and pants in the summer in order to avoid the Pointing Fingers that always seem to find me wherever I go.

I avoid situations that would place me in close visual contact with strangers. Crowds, beaches, busses, clubs sometimes, etc. I waited in line once and was at the receiving end of a pointed finger, and the person I was there with proceeded to loudly berate the person. Great. Now EVERYONE was looking at me. Despite having quite the resilient personality, I've found myself wanting to run outta there. I couldn't because we were in line, 100 people before us, 100 people after us. I was hurtin'. I went to France and Spain with no fear at the beach. Until I heard an American say, "What is wrong with her?" from 10 feet away. Great. I can't even be away from it in another country.

It doesn't help that it's about stress and how well I manage it. It doesn't help that the drugs I could take would render me unable to have kids for five years. It doesn't help that other therapies are photochemotherapy that leave me wretching and sick for the first few hours of every morning I deal with it (not to mention the lovely skin cancer side effect).

I'm just venting, don't mind me.

I once went on a drug that was an anti-organ rejection kind of drug. I cleared up in 1 week. All gone. Never there. The strangest thing. I didn't like being on it. It meant montly blood and pee tests. And it meant once I got off it, I'd go right back to 80% rebound. Shit. LIfe ain't cool. It's the ongoing debate over whether or not drugs are a good thing. They help...foster dependence. Scary. Now I understand addiction in some way. I got off it because I was too afraid of what it was doing to me.

At any rate, I just wanted to get this off my chest. I'm keenly aware that many of you don't know about this, and I'm sure many of you have been aware but have never asked me. And don't be afraid to ask, and don't be an asshole about how you ask either, although I'm sure a lot of you are not assholes.

Back to work, and thanks for the soapbox.
Voodoo

posted by Voodoo Child @ 11:07:00 AM