Skin. My skin, your skin, every last thing on this planet has some form of a skin, a shell layer that protects all the soft, important bits of our makeup. Skin. The largest constant working organ of your body. Skin. The one thing you have to wear all day everyday. A layer you can't replace with a better, shiner version of itself. Your skin is part of you, but you are not your skin.
Everyday when I wake up the first thing I do is look at the mirror and examine my skin.
"Oh, a new spot here cause of the new cream to heal the dermatitis there"
It's a constant battle with dermatitis or acne alone, but add It with an ongoing mental struggle to try see the positive in what seems like the worst situation of any young woman or man can be hard.
There's a campaign on Irish TVs currently promoting people to talk about mental health, and the main phrase in it is that the little things can help, like saying 'I'm not feeling okay' . Which they can be, for someone who might need to voice their problems in a bid to feel better. But for someone in a similar situation to me those 'little things' that can help are slightly different. Now the little things I'm referring to are the futile day to days worries that will distract me from the main problem that is truly bothering me. Skin. Some may say this is an unhealthy mind set to not talk about how I'm truly feeling about my skin issues.
But here me out.
I talk plenty about my skin. I've had some amazing conversations about skin with young and old people. But these conversations are discussions, I'm never truly conversing about my skin directly unless using it as an example. If I were to talk about skin even once a day, about how I'm feeling about it Id become bogged down with the fact that this is how I am now. This is how I look. That my dermatitis is the first thing people will notice. If I were to do this everyday those negative thoughts, those horrible sad thoughts would become me. No one wants that. I don't want that. Someone with acne will not spend time talking about their acne. And you know why? Because we have to live with seeing ourselves every day, when our skin is bad, it seems ten times worse to us.
The mental health of people with skin problems is on a knifes edge. On several occasions I've had meltdowns, breakdowns and so many moments of anxiety for no explainable reason. In August a week before I was due to go away on a break, for some unknown reason I felt like I was under enormous pressure to get things done. What things do? When written down it didn't seem like a lot. That being said, it's the little things that seem so meaningless and silly to be worried about are what keep my mental state from balancing over the wrong edge of the knife, because if I let my skin become my main worry and focus Id be an inconsolable wreck majority of the time.
The biggest challenge I've to face on a daily basis for the good of my mental health is to remind myself that I am not my skin. That my skin is just a part of me. Yes, it covers my whole body and yes I'm unfortunate enough to have it on my face. But you know what? if I stand up straight, hold my head up and keeping telling myself that I am a stronger presence than what's just on my face I can get through even the shittiest of days.
Sometimes a good cry once in a while really helps too.
But if I've learnt anything over the last 12 months it is that you've got to carry on doing what you love, focus on the better things even when it seems impossible, and fill your head with other thoughts and worrys other than skin issues and frustrations, iis the best way to keep your mind healthy. And in recent times, I've found being honest about it, makes me feel less afraid and realising at some point I will find someone who's going to accept me for how I look on good and bad days.
You can not let your skin problems become you, you are technically made of up star dust and itty bitty galaxy molecules. We've got to remind ourselves that even with our outer layer looking the way it does, there are so many better wonderful beautiful things underneath that layer that shouldn't be locked away because you've let your skin have all the power.
So tomorrow when you wake up and look in the mirror, don't look at your skin, just look at you. Because your skin doesn't make you you.
