Deanna's Journey: The Problem
Deanna doesn’t remember when her body began to turn on her, but she’s been told that eczema started taking over her life at the tender age of four. It afflicted her in the usual way, all too familiar to legions of regular sufferers, spreading from the creases of the joints of the elbows and knees.
Throughout her childhood it came and went, but a particularly bad flare up at aged fourteen led her family to seek external help. The episode, triggered by a change in diet and environment, and accompanying emotional upheaval, prompted her auntie to bring her to a skin specialist. In accordance with the received wisdom of the day, she was prescribed steroids and sunbeds. She dutifully applied the chemical creams and spent time on her own sunbed every other day after school. ‘I cringe at the damage I would have done to my skin back then,’ she ruefully reminisces.
Not only was Deanna in great pain and discomfort, with weeping flaking skin, but, as a young woman growing up in a society that places disproportionate value on female appearance, became increasingly self conscious. ‘When it became head to toe it really impacted my self esteem and confidence…I was worried I looked like a drug addict.’
Deanna fell into an awful self perpetuating cycle, by which the stress of living with her condition exacerbated her symptoms. Trapped in a pattern of worry about the eczema itself, about what people thought, about how to get better, Deanna found herself unable to sleep at night. Her unconscious body would itch itself to bleeding, worsening both her physical and psychological symptoms. In her stressed out, sleep deprived state, she found it harder to do the things she knew would help her.
In desperation she shaved off her long hair – shampoo was an irritant. She moved from a flat whose privet hedge was causing flare ups. Slowly she was discovering the things her body was asking from her in order to be well.
A revelatory moment came when her sister, a hairdresser, developed eczema on her hands in reaction to the dyes she was using. Deanna, herself a fashion student, noticed flare ups occurred when she spent lots of time cutting and working with standard fabrics. A textile science paper highlighted for her the toxicity of the materials she was working with, and how the industry green washes their processes.
Frustrated and disgusted by the damage fashion does both to the environment and individuals, she came close to quitting. But then she conceived another way, embarked on a path of passion that has led her to finally live a dream years in the making. That dream is dea, a truly natural gift for the skin.
