Now, I am free

I've been fighting with something for 10 years now, and I felt the need to finally say my part on it, somewhere, to someone, since I have never really paid attention to it or spoke about it to many people.

Let me start off by saying I know there are worse things in life, I know people have told me "you could be sick or in a wheelchair or something worse, why do you even make a big deal out of this". Even though that is true, I can't deny that what I have, has been my own struggle and my own pain, so as myself , I feel I have the right to speak about and to be bothered by what has been my own issue for years.

I've been very inspired by all the people in the world who are speaking out about what matters to them, celebrating their insecurities and revealing their own truth, so I've decided to reveal mine.

As you may know or not know, I have a serious case of acne. For 10 years, which is almost half of my life, I have been struggling with it and trying to cope with the fact that something is happening that is out of my control.

For many years I have lived without admitting to myself that it is happening and without accepting it and I have just been trying to hide it. That is what has brought me to what happened a few months ago, when I reached the point of depression, panic and anxiety attacks. See, when you don't talk about something and when you don't accept something completely, it just bottles up inside of you and naturally at some point, it will come back to you and make you deal with it.

You might think: we don't even notice it or it's not that bad, but it is. Many doctors have said they've never seen a case like mine and can't really seem to help me. Now some may think, again, no one cares about that, we all dealt with it in a way, it's a small thing compared to what's happening in the world, which is true. But I must finally talk about what has been a big part of my life and makes me the person that I am.

First of all, let me make a list of all the fuck you's I want to say and have never said:

To anyone that has ever said to me: "Why do you wear so much makeup?", "Do you clean your face in the mornings and evenings?", "With what do you clean your face?", "Maybe you should try xy", "Why is your skin like this?" and "You must be very insecure".

To every time I met someone new that started giving me "great" advice and trying to "save" me, to when I walked into a shop or a pharmacy and the salesperson felt they had the right to come to me and instead of doing their job tell me" can I ask you something, but don't get mad, do you clean your face every day?", to going to a meeting and having the other person ask me "why do you wear so much makeup, it must be the reason your face is like that", to anyone who made fun of me behind my back or to my face, to every doctor that told me "do this it will definitely help you" and made me end up in a hospital for a few days, to everyone who rudely stared at my skin, to everyone who ever felt sorry for me, to the people I just met who told me "you must be insecure with that kinda skin", to every girl that did the no makeup challenge like it's a big deal for them but has flawless skin, and to people who said to me "I think people with acne are disgusting...oh I wasn't talking about you, you're fine" - fuck you. Fuck you and your opinions and bits of advice, and fuck you thinking you have the right to speak to me about it.

I don't believe I have ever seriously told someone in their face (although I could have reciprocated many times): "you are fat, try eating less, try running sometimes, your nose is huge, your teeth are crooked, you never had a boyfriend/girlfriend, you are getting bald, you dress like a douche, your IQ is so low that it worries me, or anything"- and some of these things people can change and control, unlike me with my condition.

And I never said it, because it doesn't matter and I have no right to tell anyone anything unless it's affecting me in some negative way, especially to their face (we all gossip out of our own frustrations, and I won't say I haven't).

Now to all my "advisors", maybe I should give you a bit of my history and tell you some stuff I tried for acne:

- a gel that completely dried out my skin

- an antibiotic that put me in the hospital for 3 days and fucked up my liver

- taking my tonsils out

- taking my wisdom teeth out

- birth control

- hundreds of painful treatments

- changing my diet

- tea cleanse

- water cleanse

- allergy tests

- food allergy tests

- 2 more antibiotics

- microdermabrasion

- micro needling

- oxygen treatments

- chemical peeling

- hundreds of expensive creams and face masks

- lasers

- not doing anything for a while

- cryotherapy

- corticosteroid injections

- homeopathy

So next time someone wants to "save me" with their opinions, maybe check this list first.

If you still don't get the struggle with acne, here is just a part of what my life has been:

Try meeting a guy and struggling with the fact that he might reject you when you take your makeup off in front of him. Try living through summer. Try sleepovers. Try avoiding to wear a ponytail. Try avoiding day time and sun. Try avoiding taking pictures. Try meeting new people. Try living in fear of running into someone without makeup. Try seeing your relatives or friends after a long time and having them feel sorry for you and tell you "oh you still have it, that's terrible"

In the end, the biggest struggle is going through most of your life looking the way you don't want to look and having no power to change it.

I have had to accept that this is genetics since a few people in my family have had the same. Except I also got the amazing combo of having skin that creates scars on every occasion it can, so now I have keloids, hypertrophic scars which create sort of lumps on your skin and stay there for years and cannot be treated unless the acne goes away first. These make your skin textured and cannot be covered with any makeup.

Which is lit because now I have people asking me: "why don't you go smooth your skin out", "what is that" and the still the everlasting, life-changing: "did you try cleaning your face every morning and night".

After all this, I realized that I am mostly mad at myself, for living like this. I have allowed others to ruin many of my days, make me wish I was something I am not, to hide and for them to decide how I will feel.

So, first of all, I want to apologize to myself for spending the last 10 years in hiding, denying and wanting to change myself.

I have now accepted myself, my acne, my scars, and also my body ("omg you are too skinny", "eat something"), because it's just the way it is and I love it. In a weird way I also realized I'm grateful for having acne because it has made me stronger (I fucking hate this cliche saying but dammit it's true), it has made me focus on developing other skills and values, that don't revolve just around my appearance.

Some of my favorite people through the years have told me they love me most when I have no makeup because I act completely like myself. I'm sorry I have not listened to that before.

Do not get me wrong. I will still wear makeup because even if I didn't have acne I would wear it. Makeup is art and beautiful and pretty and there is nothing like putting on a highlighter and getting that glow or getting a new eye shadow with high pigment (bless all the "natural-I-never-wear-makeup" girls, but it's more fun on this side).

Finally, I admit, I am insecure about it. Who wouldn't be insecure about something they can't control but affects their life? But when I think about it, even though this insecurity, I managed to get a Masters degree, jobs, travel through over half of Europe, live abroad, be the vice president of two student organizations, make real and long-lasting friendships with many people and find love, and all of this makes me proud, because I am pretty sure that if most people woke up tomorrow with my skin, they wouldn't even leave their house.

So, I will keep on living my life,

only now, I am free.