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One of Healthline’s editorial interns, Kate Jensen, sat down to talk with Victoria Voos about her journey with psoriasis, self-confidence, and building community. Read the interview highlights below and the full article here. |
| *This interview has been edited for length and clarity. |
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I wanted to start just by asking for a little bit of background on your diagnosis. What was your perspective on psoriasis at the time? |
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| A: I definitely had not heard of it before. When I got diagnosed, it was because I had this bump on the top of my left foot that was very, very painful, and the only thing that helped was a steroid shot.
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| From then, it was diagnosis after diagnosis of all these different things. It was like, “Oh, you have insulin resistance.” “Oh, you have psoriasis.” “Oh, you have psoriatic arthritis.” “Oh, you have PCOS.” So, it was kind of a crazy-pants time. I took NSAIDs [nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs] for the joint pain, and then that gave me stomach ulcers. It was one thing after another.
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| Probably the most upsetting part of it was learning that … you have to manage [psoriasis] the rest of your life. It might get better, but you might also have flare-ups. So that began a really long journey of discovering what medications worked and paying lots of money to dermatologists for all sorts of different creams, shots, pills.
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| Q: |
Has that affected the way you see yourself [...] or your self-confidence? |
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| A: I think it actually helped a little bit. Finding things that help relieve the symptoms on my face made me appreciate that the psoriasis was mostly in spots that were covered. I don’t think I would appreciate my skin as much as I do now if it hadn’t gotten so bad.
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| I also found some really great communities online by talking about psoriasis and plus-size fashion on social media. You find your people who are going through similar things, and we’re all talking about empowerment and awareness of what we’re all going through.
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| Q: |
I wanted to know if there’s anything else you’d like readers to know about your experience in general [...] or anything we’ve talked about today?
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| A: I think it’s important to remember that you just don’t know what people are going through. It’s very possible that a lot of [psoriasis] is not [visible]. What I have right now is under my clothes and inflammation within my body, which causes a lot of joint pain. That’s the biggest thing I would want to scream from the rooftops. Just be kind. You never know what people are going through. |
| To read more psoriasis-specific content, subscribe to our psoriasis newsletter here. To find your own online psoriasis community, check out Bezzy Psoriasis. And don’t forget to rate this interview on the smiley scale at the end of this email!
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