My Skin Hates Me
I’m now convinced my skin hates me. First off, when I was a teenager I had acne. Nothing like my brothers had, but when you’re a 16 year old girl any acne is a bad thing. I washed and washed and washed my face and it made no difference. There the zits were morning after morning. Creeping on my forehead and chin. They weren’t the zonkers some of my friends were cursed with, but acne is acne. I used all the over-the-counter stuff, nothing worked. I went to a dermatologist, and it helped manage the acne, but nothing eliminated it. Then came my stretch marks. On my chest and hips, WTF! I cant stand them. It looks like a bald eagle swooped down and mauled me. These damn things wont go anywhere. I’ve bought the crappy creams on TV, the mall products at $100 for 4 ounces, NO DIFFERENCE! I don’t get it. Every women and most men have them, you’d think that these companies and doctors would get off their butts and make something that works. Whoever does is in for some serious dough, I tell you. But nothing seems to work. I’ve read around the web and some are touting lasers that can treat them, but other doctors say they are effective and its mostly marketing hype. Lord knows I’ve falling for some hype around other products in the past. When it comes to skin products us women buy into the hype, BIG TIME. Go into Macys or Nordstroms and you are surrounded by cosmetic counters. The entire Men’s Department of your local department store could fit into the storage locker of the women’s cosmetic counter. There are products for everything, Sun Screens, Wrinkle Fighters, Tone & Texture, Age Spots, Stretch Marks, Cellulite, Fine Lines, Crow’s Feet, the whole nine yards. You name it, they have a lotion or potion to cure it. It’s a billion dollar a year business. They have whole stores just for that. Personally I have not experienced any real difference with any of the products I’ve tried. They all seem to make my skin moist for awhile, which serves to ‘smooth’ some of the skin, but very temporarily. I could fill 20 boxes with all the products I’ve wasted money on. So my advice if you are looking for the magic pill for your stretch marks or acne etc, see a doctor, they have the degree for a reason..
Posted at 04:46PM Jun 05, 2008 in General |
Apple Failing Farther from the Tree
My mom wants Botox®. She has for a long time. She doesn’t look 48, but she certainly feels it. So she has projected that onto her own self-confidence and that is manifesting itself in a trip to our local dermatologist for America’s youth serum, Blessed Botox. She wants me to drive her because she is nervous about needles. A few years ago she needed some blood testing due to a cancer scare, and she was seriously considering not allowing them to take her blood. Cancer. But a few unwanted wrinkles on her brow and she is making the 35 minute trek in traffic to get some wrinkle treatment. Make no mistake, I’m all for cosmetic treatments. I’m all for Botox, Chemical Peels, Plastic Surgery and the like. I fully intend to have a breast augmentation soon. To my way of thinking if you are from the good ole USA and are a female, unnaturally large breasts are a birthright, like voting or fast food. My only problem with this little trip today is that my mom is a hypocrite. She has derided me for years for wearing “too much make up”. She complains about young girls at the mall with their “boobs showing”. She watches the show on Bravo “Real Housewives of Orange County” only to make fun of the shallow women on there. And don’t get me started on the needle-shy cancer incident. So I was a bit disturbed when I got the call last week asking if I’d be able to drive her to the dermatologist for a little Botox. “WHAT!?” I said, partly shocked and partly proud. She admitted her secret longing to do something about the wrinkles making their way across her brow for some time. I did what any daughter of a clearly fragile and insecure mother would do when the mother was looking for support and assurance, I made fun of her. “OH look at the hypocrite NOW! She’s begging for the NEEDLE!”. I shouldn’t poke too much fun, if I play my cards just right, I may be able to swing a pair of breasts from this whole situation.
Posted at 10:30PM Apr 12, 2008 in General |
Shopping: The Solution
I love it. You love it. We all do. What could possibly be more intoxicating than wandering store to store trying on clothes we shouldn’t, then buying them on store credit they are all too willing to grant you. It makes you feel better, in fact, it makes you better. Clothes don’t make the man (all women know this to be true), for men don’t really care about what other men wear, and women don’t either. Sure, if a guy walks into a job interview in a duck costume, he’s probably not getting hired unless the job is selling cotton candy in Tomorrow Land. But women not only judge other girls on their outfit, they set their entire basis for interacting with you on it. Whether we talk or not, whether you are nice to someone or not, help them with homework, get help from them, join their study group, all are based on these sweat-shop sewn drapes we throw on. I am not justifying it. In fact, writing it now makes me feel quite stupid to know I do this myself. But the truth of the matter is simple and unchanging, Clothes Make the Woman. With that in mind, I shop daily. And its great. The sweet aroma of perfumes wafting in the air, mannequins with absurd dimensions wearing clothes three times the average American’s monthly salary, jewelry, shoes (oh the shoes). Its better than heroine, more loving than Grandma, and more comforting than any boyfriend. I’d see any of my old boyfriends thrown down a well for a $100 gift card to Nordstroms’. I have bought clothes just to own them. I’ve naturally never worn them, but that’s not the point. I OWN them now. They pile up in the closet with the others. They no longer serve a purpose. Like gum that’s lost its taste only to be spit out. They gave me that temporary satisfaction and now they are old. Done. And therein lies the rub. This type of living ain’t cheap. I see that now. It may be time to rethink things. I know what you’re thinking, “BLASPHEMY!”. How dare she attack that Holy of Holies, Shopping. Better she burns every Church and Synagogue on Earth than challenge our materialist society. And don’t mistake me, Im no socialist. I like money and things. In fact, they define me for the most part. Should we ever meet, I assure you that you will know the name of my shoe brand within two minutes of our greeting. But I’m merely wondering aloud if perhaps this isn’t, well, shallow? I’ll get back to you on this…
Posted at 03:21PM Mar 20, 2008 in General |
Another Stupid Blog
This is yet another exercise in narcissism. I will not deny it. I’ve stared into my own glorious digital reflection and become fixated by it. Hopefully by being fixated as such, I can ignore the cravings for chocolate and Haagen Dazs (if you know how to correctly spell it, you REALLY love it) long enough to lose a few. Being a 22 year old woman is an awkward time. You stand astride your teens and sophomoric concerns of what your friends think and how you look and if you can go shopping or not, and adult concerns of what your friends think and how you look and if you can…well, so I haven’t really grown. But at least age has given me slightly more introspection than I once had. Now I realize the destructive nature of insecurity, and Im attempting to do something about it. Women know what I mean. You can see it when you walk into a party and all the other girls give you “the look”. It’s that look that every woman in every country on the planet knows. I’m sure even burqa-clad Afghan women do it. It’s the bottom-to-top scan and dismissive pass of the eyes meant to denigrate the observed as being a lesser woman than the observer. We all are victims to it, as well as being victimizers. At once its meant to display superiority while also a dead give-away of our own deep-rooted insecurity. I’m trying to reprogram my own behavior in this regard, but reversing evolution is hard. I’m sure Paleolithic women sat around their well-tended campfires throwing squinty-eyed darts at those ugly chicks at the other campfire. Surely our wood smells better and has less ants than theirs. So my hope with this blog is to pass along my own observations and hard-learned lessons and be of some use to you. It will be an interesting experience, full of mistakes and tragedies, but at least we don’t build campfires anymore.
Posted at 08:37AM Feb 29, 2008 in General |
About this Blog:
Being a female who has struggled with self confidence can be difficult. My weight, clothes, cosmetics, and skin are always on my mind. This blog is about that struggle. It is intended to be of use to me, primarily, as a place to vocalize my feelings and experiences and learn something from them. That said, I do hope it can be helpful to others as well. Being insecure tends to make you self-absorbed (think Oprah), but by attempting to make my experiences useful to others I’m optimistic I can transcend this habit and think less of me and more of how I can be of use to others. I want to thank all my girlfriends for their strong support of this blog and kicking me in the pants to write it. Enjoy!
Posted at 09:28PM Jan 21, 2008 in General |