Psoriasis

Your skin is renewing itself — far too fast. What normally takes four weeks happens in three to four days. Cells push to the surface before they are mature, and pile up there: red, inflamed patches covered in silvery-white scales. At the elbows, the knees, the scalp — at the places that come into contact with the world most. Sometimes the patches spread. Sometimes they attack the nails, thickening and hollowing them out. Sometimes the joints become inflamed.

Medically, psoriasis is an autoimmune disease — your immune system attacks your own skin, accelerates cell division, and sustains the inflammation. Psychosomatically, a different question arises: What inside you is under such pressure that your body is literally growing thicker skin? And why is that skin never enough?

Psoriasis is not a skin disease. It is armour that is never finished.