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Iman: Morphea

When it got too hot and I would take off my jacket, people would be so disgusted with my arm.

My name is Iman and I was diagnosed with morphea when I was six years of age, and now I am fourteen years old. I do not know how I got it. I must of have forgotten. But when I got it, it was a brown spot.

The following year it started to get harder. And when it got harder it started to hurt me very badly. I would have sudden pain throughout my body.

For a long time I would try to hide it by always wearing sweaters or jackets or even long sleeve shirts all through the year. When it got too hot and I would take off my jacket, people would be so disgusted with my arm. I would always cry about it and I still do. I went to about fifteen different dermatologists throughout my life. They would just say that it is just dry skin, a common rash, or even eczema.

Finally, I found a doctor at the University of Chicago (where I live). She then told me that it was called morphea and she gave me this cream and it really gave me a boost in life to wear short sleeve shirts.

Even though I still have it, my case of morphea has gotten better in a week's time.

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ISN Artist: Sherrill Knaggs (In Loving Memory)

Sherrill Knaggs, ISN Artist, created the digital photo to illustrate the story on this page. Sherrill lived in New Zealand. Her story was featured in ISN's book, Voices of Scleroderma Volume 2.

ISN Story Editor: Judith Thompson Devlin

Judith Thompson Devlin is the ISN Story Editor for this story. She is also lead editor of the ISN's wonderful Voices of Scleroderma book series!

SCLERO.ORG was the world's leading nonprofit for trustworthy research, support, education and awareness for scleroderma and related illnesses from 1998 to 2021. It was a grassroots movement from the original Scleroderma from A to Z web site, which was founded by Shelley Ensz. We were a 501(c)(3) U.S.-based public charitable foundation. We closed this web site and our nonprofit agency in April 2021.