My New Job Was Killing My Skin

Earlier this year, I took on a job that felt like it was everything I’ve ever wanted in a position. It was work-from-home and full-time with a decent salary. I haven’t been this excited over something in a very long time. In the beginning, it was great. I wasn’t necessarily conscious of things changing, but my body certainly was. What I didn't know was that my new job was killing my skin, and killing me.

Impact of stress on psoriasis

I worked hard to get my overall health and skin to what I consider decent condition. Suddenly, or what felt like suddenly, I was plagued with itchy, angry red, and flaking skin. I brushed it off as a blip on the radar and it too shall pass. This was pretty naive of me considering that every other time that I’ve had a skin eruption, a stressor is usually present.

As I’m sure many of you can relate, stress affects our entire body. It was impacting my sleep, my ability to digest and take meds for other chronic illnesses properly and it was affecting my skin. Yet, I was blind to it.

Is my new job causing my psoriasis flares?

It wasn’t until about the third month in, when I was speaking up about being stressed that everything began to register. By then, my entire scalp was inflamed, and my usual spots where plaques form on the scalp were visible. I was flaking like a dandruff snow princess. My other condition’s symptoms were making their presences known as well.

It was an increase in dosing frequency of the biologic I’ve been on since 2016 that helped get my skin and other conditions under control. I saw such a difference in a very short amount of time. And then as quickly as it came on, it felt like it was slipping away. I grew fearful that all of the progress the new dosing structure had brought me would become irrelevant. Then I became fearful that even if I removed the stressor(s) symptoms wouldn’t, nor couldn’t, improve once again.

The fear was real.

Choosing my health over my job

My husband who had witnessed some of the issues going on with my job wouldn’t tell me to quit. The nerve! He kept telling me that it was my decision. It was frustrating on many levels. I didn’t suck at the job, management kept making concessions to make me happy and get me to stay. However, I wasn’t happy either. I previously wrote about being a skin picker. I'm notorious for skin picking when facing stressful matters. I soon found myself picking at newly formed plaques and scales. When I found blood on the tip of my nails, the gravity of the situation began to sink in. It wasn’t too long after that my Crohn’s disease symptoms began to fiercely make their presence known.

In the end, I had to choose my health.

Happy to have my skin not flaring

To be honest, I loved portions of the job. There were two people who absolutely made my life and the lives of others a nightmare. They were the source of stress and I could not escape that stress unless I left it behind. It killed my pride to choose the job or not having raw weeping skin all over my body and living in the bathroom. In the end, I chose health.

Now that a couple of months have passed, I’m happy to report, my skin is healing and the symptoms belonging to the other chronic illnesses are dissipating.

Has your job ever impacted your psoriasis or other conditions to the point that you had to walk away?