Rachel York, 35, has lived with psoriasis for 20 years. Rachel, who works in social media, first developed the condition at the age of 15 and has battled against it ever since. Although she’s not sure what triggered her condition, she suspects it may have been due to teenage stress, although this was never identified at the time as her condition took a long time to be properly diagnosed.
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Rachel suffers from a rarer ‘teardrop’ form of psoriasis which means she has hundreds of itchy patches on different parts of her body but it mainly affects her legs, trunk, ribcage, stomach and back. Psoriasis also affects her scalp, which can be extremely painful and debilitating.
“When I’d had a particularly bad flare up, people assumed I’d been away on holiday and savaged by mosquitos,” she says. “I used to get comments all the time, which was hurtful and upsetting but as you get older you learn to live with the glares and the remarks.”
Rachel recalls a holiday in Egypt when she was a teenager that stands out as a particularly painful memory: “I heard a young boy ask his mum ‘ewww – what is wrong with her?’ as he stared at my red, raw, itchy skin. It really hit me hard and completely ruined the rest of my holiday. I remember effectively isolating myself in public so as to avoid attracting any more comments and I’d have very little interaction with others, which was very sad given that I was on holiday hoping to make friends and meet people. The other important thing was that sunlight is great for my psoriasis and there I was covering up and sitting in the shade, all the while making the condition worse.
“In the years that followed, in hot weather I’d be wearing long sleeves and long trousers, not daring to expose my body and limbs which I knew would benefit so much from the sunlight. It was a vicious circle. Such was the impact of those comments on my confidence back then.”
In her mid-twenties, Rachel refused to let psoriasis get the better of her. She vowed to not let it knock her confidence as it had when she was a teenager and she did her best to lead a normal life, ignoring what others might think or say about her skin.
“There have been times when it’s been unbearable to deal with and the itching has been relentless. Sometimes, I’ve sat at home alone, crying my eyes out and scratching my legs until they gush with blood. This is when the psoriasis was at its very worst for me and I was at my lowest.”
Rachel has tried every treatment from countless steroid creams, vitamin supplements, coconut oils, medications and phototherapy without success. “I was always greasy and shiny from all the moisturising,” she laughs, “but the reality was nothing worked. I was at the end of my tether with it all.”
Rachel even enlisted with a very reputable dermatologist at Guy’s Hospital, one of the best specialists available and the next bout of treatment was a course of immune suppressants, which Rachel was very reluctant to try but seemingly had no choice:
“I’ve always been interested in natural products and I’m not a pill taker so most of these treatments really went against the grain for me, especially the immune suppressant treatment which was the next course of action for me. I then found out that one of the side effects was potential liver damage and that I couldn’t go out in the sunlight at all. This was the final straw as I was going on a trip to Thailand and the sun would’ve helped relieve my psoriasis so to be told I couldn’t risk this and must stay completely covered up or even indoors, was a massive blow.
“That’s when I hit the internet and stumbled across Sorion and HelloSkin. I’d heard that turmeric was supposed to have great healing properties so when I found this I thought I had nothing to lose and gave it a shot after reading about the ingredients. Within just a few days of using Sorion the changes were staggering, my skin started to clear up completely and was just getting better and better. I could not believe it and neither could my wife, Jasmine who immediately noticed the mood change as well as the physical changes. It was such an odd feeling as I’d got used to living with this for so long but you don’t really realise how bad something like this can be until it has gone. It was nice to have people complimenting me on my skin and my appearance for a change rather than being unpleasant.
“My skin had not been this clear for over 20 years so for it to just virtually disappear overnight was life changing for me. I was frightened I may run out so decided to stock up on Sorion and bought several tubes from the HelloSkin website.”
When Rachel returned to see her dermatologist, she couldn’t believe the results. Rachel was visibly so much better and raving about the cream to her specialist, pleading with her to recommend it to others! “I was effectively discharged by my dermatologist and just need to go back in a year now, if there are any problems. To go from trying all treatments known to man to this in such a short space of time was miraculous.”
Rachel has not had a single flare up since she started using Sorion. She’s been able to enjoy this summer more than any in living memory and that, combined with the effects of the Sorion has made her feel even better. She’s looking forward to the winter – a period when flare ups would typically be at their worst for many psoriasis sufferers – with a renewed sense of optimism.
“Sorion has been a game changer for me. I normally dread the autumn and winter months as my flare ups in the past have been awful following the summer months but now I’m less worried than I’ve ever been. As a huge advocate of natural remedies and holistic treatments, I’m so glad I found Sorion as it has turned my life around. I just wish I could have found it sooner.”
For further details about HelloSkin, an international platform offering products and guidance for people living with chronic skin conditions, please visit https://www.helloskin.co.uk/