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One White Patch At a Time: My Story of Living with Vitiligo
If there’s one thing that has stayed with me ever since I was born, it has to be the white patches on my skin.
Although my vitiligo had been dormant for years, I can now see it thriving on my skin. This sudden change has brought too many emotions to handle. Is it easy seeing your skin change all of a sudden? Is it easy to see people looking at you differently? Would I be now only identified as the girl with white skin?
For those of you who don’t know, vitiligo is a skin disorder that causes loss of skin colour. It is an auto-immune condition which means that the body itself starts considering skin-producing cells (melanocytes) as outsiders and keeps on destroying the cells. This results in loss of skin colour and white patches on some parts of the body. Over time, these white patches begin to grow more and get bigger. The rate of growth, however, is varied. It may be a few weeks for some and years for others. I fall in the category of the latter.
I received vitiligo as a genetic gift from my parents in the year 1995. With too many cries, burps, and a white patch, I opened my eyes to the world. It’s been 30 years of meeting and greeting the world with the same eyes (now with spectacles) and a few patches (still lingering…
