For more than 30 years experts dismissed my angry red hives as rosacea. In fact, I have an autoimmune condition that affects thousands of menopausal women but is often misdiagnosed. These are the other symptoms to look out for

Lupus is an incurable, lifelong condition that causes your immune system to attack your own skin, creating a distinctive red rash. I was grateful I didn’t have the more severe form known as systemic lupus, which is linked to joint pain, exhaustion and - thank you, Google - damage to the lungs, heart, kidneys and brain. She misdiagnosed me with the skin condition rosacea and I spent the next 30 years thinking that was the cause. I’m annoyed with myself for not getting the rash checked out again much sooner, thinking of all those summers I wasted with itchy red lumps. There’s no cure for lupus, but there are several different drug treatments available to control the symptoms of systemic lupus, which I have up to a 20 per cent chance of developing.