Reset Your Default

Watching one of the dating shows on Netflix, I heard someone say “My darling. Even the beautiful moon has scars.” This was in response to her sharing the trauma of her skin in a car accident, I believe. This struck me like a self-love seed planted in my psyche.

Skin Health Background

I have had skin issues for the majority of my life. I was one of the first children to catch and bring home chicken pox. My immune system was fairly weak when I was young. I must have scratched every mark. Around the age of 11, I began to show signs of PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome), with excessive body hair, that often led to ingrown hair, which almost always led to hyperpigmentation and scarring.

Gluten also affected my skin in the form of eczema, which manifested as seborrheic dermatitis that appeared as dandruff. Also, cystic acne. My naturopath helped me make the connection in 2015. While cutting it out of my diet helped, it wasn’t the cure for all that ailed me.

For a long time, I’ve explored many options to heal the root cause of my skin issues. I’ve taken supplements; hired aestheticians for laser hair removal, chemical peels, microneedling, and I’m sure there’s more. Due to the fluctuation of my hormone levels with PCOS, progress in healing my skin comes and goes.

Exploring My Response

This year, in quarantine, attention was redirected away from how to fix the root cause of it and toward ways to address my response to the symptoms. I learned years ago that my two-decades long response is called dermatillomania or excoriation disorder or chronic skin-picking.

When I discovered this, I was overwhelmed and horrified by all of these names, so I stopped calling it anything. When I was ready, I simply made the request to my closest friends to gently draw my attention to the action, if it happens in front of them or to ask me how I’m holding up, if there’s proof of picking.

No one can check my problematic behavior they can’t see and that I hide well, when we’re self-isolating for the pandemic. That said, I’ve built my self-awareness muscles quite a bit in recent years, and noticed the compulsion to self-soothe by attacking my skin grew stronger. I decided therapy wasn’t exactly the move to discuss this because I tried that for a long time and that modality rarely helped me put a dent in the behavior.

By Another Name

I started searching for the uncomfortable sounding names I learned years before and stumbled upon a new one, Body-Focused Repetitive Behaviors (BFRBs). It isn’t an obsessive-compulsive disorder or in the same category as self-harm, like cutting. It’s an impulse control behavior. Other examples include hair pulling and biting nails or the inside of your cheeks.

Learning the expanded language around BFRBs has made it so much easier for me to be open to solutions and to talk about it with people in my life. And some of these people only popped on my radar this year.

BFRB Community

Along with discovering the new name, I identified support groups. In 2017, my therapist suggested it was time to “graduate” to group therapy or support groups. At the time, I wasn’t sure what groups to join or what my options were. This year it was clear. I joined three virtual BFRB support group meetups—national, San Francisco and Atlanta. The group in my city didn’t have enough engagement to sustain virtual meetups.

This group has helped me feel more connected to the world with the reminder that there’s a place for all of us. I see other women who I honestly cannot tell that they have a BRFB. I’ve been told people can’t see that about me. When I look in the mirror, it is honestly most of what I see.

Reprogramming Beauty

Seeing myself through a new lens is my work right now. The slow work of healing my skin is forcing me to practice patience and to grow my self-love while I wait. In high school, my first boyfriend called me pizza face. At home, my mom and sister referred to me as a “cheetah” because I was “so spotty.” I am aware now that wounded people project their pain onto others.

I also have more resources now to reset thoughts about my body. One that is in development is self-acceptance. Another is a gang of girlfriends who see me through the rosiest lenses. And quick quips from reality tv are helping. To hear “even the beautiful moon has scars” changed something in me.

I absolutely love the moon at all stages. If I can feel that for the moon, I can turn a bit of that admiration around toward myself.