About Me
My name is Caroline Haye and I write about vitiligo. Not because I am medically qualified (which I am not). And not because I can give you any amazing results of double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trials to back my experience. (Which I can’t.) I write about vitiligo because it has had a big impact on my life. And because I love to share the experiences and information I have picked up over a lifetime of losing, and re-gaining, my skin colour. (More about me and my journey with vitiligo below.)
My journey with vitiligo
My vitiligo began when I was a toddler and developed slowly during childhood. It spread more rapidly through my adult years until it covered about 80% of my body and my entire face. My mother was the only person (apart from a doctor or two) I ever told about it until, in my twenties, I met the gorgeous man who would become my husband. Telling him was a big deal for me but I needn’t have worried. He never seemed to notice my two-tone skin. I was the only one it bothered.
I felt as if I was the only person in the world who had this strange condition. What was it about me that had singled me out? Vitiligo was not a word I had ever heard before my doctor diagnosed it. And there was no access to any information. So I kept my patches, and my distress, under wraps for decades. Make-up, camouflage and carefully chosen clothes were my best friends. They kept my secret safe and they made me feel confident enough to push vitiligo to the back of my mind for a few hours a day at least.
I didn’t realise how may people are affected by vitiligo until the internet made it possible to learn more about it. From then on I read everything I could find on the subject and tried quite a few forms of treatment, including PUVA and various complementary therapies. But nothing worked. In fact a couple of them burned my skin quite badly.
My surprise recovery
I eventually accepted the fact no cure for vitiligo would be found in my lifetime. And, of course, there still isn’t one yet. But, to my complete surprise one spring, I actually began to re-pigment after a few weeks of doing nothing out of the ordinary apart from taking nutritional supplements and regularly sitting out in gentle sunshine for short periods of time.
A few pale freckles on my chest were the first sign that anything was happening. I couldn’t believe it. I even scrubbed them with a towel, thinking they must be the remnants of fake tan. But they were real and they just kept multiplying until, roughly a year and a half later, I had almost all of my natural colour back. I have not re-gained 100% of my pigment but it’s not far short of that. And the re-pigmentation has remained stable for nearly ten years so far.
How I became a vitiligo blogger
This experience was so unexpected and so exciting that I wanted to tell everyone about it. I decided to put my story onto the internet (which was still pretty new back then) and so I started my vitiligo blog. I wanted to share my good news and to be that source of hope, encouragement and information that had been so lacking back when I had needed it most.
The numbers of other people with vitiligo who read my story and got in touch took me by surprise and made me realise that none of us has ever been alone, even if we felt like we were. Somewhere along this journey my excitement became a total fascination with all things vitiligo and turned me into a vitiligo blogger who loves learning and passing on as much information, encouragement and hope as I possibly can.
As more people visited my blog I received increasing numbers of requests for information about the nutritional supplements I used. And so I created a site where all of these products could be purchased in one place: Vitiligo Store.
Now I spend most of my productive hours researching information for both websites and corresponding with vitiligo friends all over the world. I am always happy to hear from anyone affected by the condition and to help in any way possible, so please feel free to contact me. I promise to answer you personally.
For more information about me and about others who have had similar experiences, take a look at the My Story and Vitiligo Success Stories pages.
Please be aware that any tips or suggestions on this site and in any correspondence are based purely on my own experiences and research and do not constitute a medical diagnosis or treatment programme.