To me, psoriasis is the face of my body and the first thing people see. During winter with a flare up, I'm covered and no one sees a thing. I can hide my arms, hide my legs, ignore it and feel pretty for a period of time. Jeans, leggings, long-sleeves and jumpers are my safety blankets.
Once summer comes, attempts to shave my legs over my plaques is a BLOODY MESS. Pun INTENDED 🙃 - the struggle is real and half of the time, I need to wait just under a week for my spots to be flat enough after using  steroid cream over consecutive days. 

It is a constant battle I face every day with my flare up. Whether it's walking down the street, attending a gathering or going to the beach, all eyes are on me. I literally feel like singing lyrics from Will.I.Am & Britney B##ch:

"When we up in the club, all eyes on us" 

Some days I embrace my skin and have no worries about how bad it is because it is all in my head... Otherdays however, countless mental breakdowns over what to wear and what will cover me up the most, are the days of not coping well with the judgement and being stared. Whether it is out of pure curiosity or people thinking "wow she's game" or "she is still beautiful", putting skin out there for the world to see makes me vulnerable and I HATE that. 

Below, you can see a girl in an orange shirt. That's me. This was taken at Harry Potter World, London UK, September 2023. I had dreamt of going to Europe since I was child. I had dreamt of the day I'd be catching that plane to Europe. Well unfortunately, my excitement was crumbling and anxiety was kicking in. I mean, I knew I was going to a country with people I've never met before nor will see again but it was still playing on my mind. At the time we were going, summer was just ending but they were still going through a heat wave. And what does a heat wave mean to me? Oh yeah, that I would have to show my skin. To have new people stare at me. To feel vulnerable and reluctant to take photos with my family because I know I won't post them and show people back home what I really look like. 

So that photo there, I did post it on my Instagram but with a twist. I googled for apps to download that erased, air brushed and did all that beauty sh#t. Using this app, I hid the spots on my legs and posted it. No one knew. My best friend didn't know, my other friends didn't know and my partner didn't take any notice until I said something. "Well no one took any notice, shouldn't that make you feel good?" The truthful answer is no it didn't. Why you may ask? Because I was hiding the real me. I was trying to be a cover girl hiding my true body image.  

I showed a few family members the edited version and they were like "Oh yeah nice!", "You look nice!" and "Good photo Lans!". Little did they know that wasn't the original. Once I showed them the unedited version, they said they had no idea and didn't take any notice. And that was the whole point, for no one to take any notice.