My body also changes due to stress. I get rashes on my hand if I get stressed for more than 2 days at a stretch.
When my sleep was fixed, it went away. Then went though a short period of it happening again, and the rash came back.
Out of interest, what's ASM?
Nice reply, agreed that docs are a great bunch, upvoted.
I get mild eczema and sometimes have periods of insomnia, I've noticed not sleeping enough for a few days to be something that often seems linked to a break-out of raw itchy patches.
Also rubbing is often a subconscious "tick" while stressed, so you may be putting extra strain on the skin that way too?
"It is also possible for emotional stress to trigger an outbreak of hives. There can be a number of hormonal or chemical changes that occur in response to stress.
These changes can trigger blood vessels to expand and leak, causing red and swollen patches of skin."
No doubt, stress has physiological effects, but so does laughter and excitement. Having stress is a normal part of being a human. In reasonable doses it's fine.
In my case, small patches of skin went really dry and itchy, and eventually fell off, like dead skin after a sunburn.
My dad had it on his scalp once too. He had a few circular patches (~3cm) with total hair loss, which eventually grew back.
Neither of us had that happen again.
My GP simply recommended using superglue to seal the cracks up and that did help!