SHOUT!

[Content Warning added 20Jan2014 for use of ableist slurs.]

I just remembered - the first time I did it, and why.

I mean, as I've mentioned already, I'd been scratching since forever. But that was about the limit of it, until I was, oh, I guess eleven or twelve. I used to buy this magazine called SHOUT!. I think they still sell it today. A kind of teen magazine for pre-teens who wanted to feel older than they were; a smaller, cheaper and tackier version of Sugar, giving away free lipsticks or hair pins or sequinned purses with every issue. And they had this article, one fortnight, on looking after your complexion.

You should never squeeze out your spots, they will heal faster if you leave them alone, read the first sentence. Well, that wasn't news; I figured every idiot knew that much. And who'd want to squeeze a spot anyway? That's the kind of thing that gross, greasy teenage boys do when nobody is looking. Yuck.

And then the next sentence, and the real point of the article: But if you feel you really must squeeze them, then this is how best to do it.

It wasn't just curiosity. This was meant to be a magazine for cool, pretty girls. The implication was that cool, pretty girls just have to get rid of that spot. That a compulsion to squeeze them out is healthy and normal, and that only an ugly retarded freak would leave it sitting there for the whole world to see.

I was tired of being a retarded freak. I guess I had started buying SHOUT! in the hope that maybe, just maybe, it could teach me to be a cool, pretty, popular kid.

Fuck you, SHOUT! magazine.

Happy Shiny Freckles

Lah!

Okay. So life is good. And it's nice to write that, because usually when I come back here to write something, it's because everything has gone horribly wrong. BUT! Posts here are not particularly regular - and it's VERY worth noting that, when I am not posting psychotic rantings, I'm really doing rather well ^_^

I have a week off work this week and I've been kinda bored sometimes during the day (but not going to the mirror just for something to do like I would have a couple years ago :P) so I visited the SPOM! board for the first time in ages. I realised just how long it had been since I was last there when I saw a private message that somebody had sent me way back in May! So I replied, and she replied, and the end result is that I am getting free copies of the novel "A New You" sent to me in the post, and I can give them to libraries and stuff and then more people can read this book and hopefully gain a better understanding and awareness of dtM! *dances* I feel all sexy and important! See me contribute stuffs!

For more information on the book "A New You", see this SPOM thread:
http://www.stoppickingonme.com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=4133
I mean it! Open it up in a new tab right now!

Also, on Monday evening I am finally going to take the SPOM! cards that Jane sent me (three months ago, lol) to my local doctor's surgery, as I last went for a checkup just before I received the cards, so this is the first time I've been to my doctor since. And I'm going to ask if I can leave them on the counter so people can take one, and thus further awarenesses shall be spread, oh yus >:D

This is AMAZING. When I first found out about this being an actual disorder, and not just me being a total fuck-up in my own special and disgusting little way, I did read some threads on message boards that made reference to raising awareness: giving lectures in schools, getting onto chat shows, documentaries, and so on and so on. And way back then, that was like, EEK. I mean, I appreciated that it was an excellent idea, but... something for OTHER people to do, you know? Because I couldn't possibly. I couldn't possibly stand up in front of all those people and tell them that no, I don't have chicken pox, and no, I don't have acne or any other kind of skin complaint, and no, I don't need to find 'the right face wash product for me' - couldn't possibly throw away every lie that I had ever let anyone believe and just tell them that I did it to myself, every night, and couldn't stop. The mere thought of it made me feel like a hunted rabbit.

And now... Why is it different now? Is it just because I don't look that way anymore, because my skin is now more often clear than not? Or is it because I am gaining confidence simply from knowing that I am beating this, not all at once, not with a magic cure, but day by day by day just not giving up and forgiving myself for the mistakes and keeping going, and then looking back every so often and going, "WOW! Look how far I came!"

I don't go to mirrors deliberately anymore. I can't remember the last time I did - maybe more than a year ago. I didn't realise that until a couple of days ago, and when I did, I made myself take a moment to just simply sit and feel enormously proud of myself. Focussing on the positive is very important - I think a large part of this disorder stems from being a perfectionist, from dismissing the things that go well as just 'normal' and making a huge deal out of the tiniest slip-up or the smallest blocked pore. We ignore the good and see only the bad. THIS is what needs changing.

Of course I do still make mistakes. The mistakes usually happen when I catch my reflection in passing - when I need to go to the bathroom and that big old mirror is just THERE. Caleb drew a smiley face in the corner of my bathroom mirror. A lot of the time, that helps some. And what's REALLY fantastic is that I am moving into a little studio flat of my own in a couple of weeks - and this means...

I CAN DO WHATEVER I WANT WITH THE MIRRORS.

It's going to be amazing. When I looked around the place, I noted there was a large wall mirror in the hallway, and a small stand-up mirror on the shelf over the bathroom sink. Well they will both get put away in the big bathroom cupboard, faces against the wall, as my first act as tenant. Since I don't go to mirrors deliberately anymore, that ought to be enough - just to have them out of the way where they won't catch me unawares. I guess I will have to take one out to do my hair every morning so I don't turn up to work looking like I got dragged through a hedge backwards, but I am hoping this will be okay. Especially if I put it a few feet away from me - three cheers for being short-sighted.

Well! I think I am now going to go and find a little café somewhere and order myself a decaff cappuccino and some doorstep toast, and sit reading American Gods and watch the world go by. After all. I deserve to reward myself ^__^


Project Authenticity Editorial Note 18th Feb 2012:
'I feel all sexy and important! See me contribute stuffs!'  ---  (from the third paragraph)
I find it interesting, in retrospect, that I have always been so quick to crowbar a sexual implication into the expression of my feelings without really noticing what I'm doing.  In addition to the above example, I can recall countless occasions when I have jestingly referred to myself as a prostitute when describing attributes of myself that I perceive as negative, or think that others will perceive as negative.  Lazy whore.  Sarcastic ho-bag.  Silly tart.  Greedy slut.  The strong and completely unconscious connection I draw above between sexy and important is very telling, I think.  At this time, in my mind, they were one and the same thing.  When I felt important, I felt sexy.  And when I failed at being sexy - which I considered to be the case the overwhelming majority of the time - I failed at being important, and thus became wholly insignificant in my own eyes.  I very much doubt I am alone in this.  I think vast legions of girls are growing up in a world that teaches them to value themselves this way.

Everyone Else

Everyone else is so perfect and beautiful
Everyone else is so thin
Everyone else has such bright glossy hair
And such smooth irresistible skin

Nobody else ever wanted for normal
So bad that they wished on a star
Everyone else plays with makeup for pleasure
And not to conceal who they are

Everyone else is so happy and confident
Everyone else has it all
Nobody else puts their hair in their face
And tries hard to look boring and small

There are times I am certain that everyone else
Must be feeling revulsion and pity
But everyone else is most often just asking
Why everyone else looks so pretty.

LOL @ ME

[Content Warning added 20Jan2014 for trichotillomania aka hair pulling.]

Oh. My. Gawd.

So I gave up caffeinated coffee because I read that reducing my caffeine would help my skin be clearer. And then I felt a bit shit and germy this morning, so at college today I've been drinking STRONG coffee with EXTRA sugar, ALL FUCKING DAY.

I am so having the world's greatest caffeine/sugar crash XD;;

Okay! Plan of doing-ment!

1) Make a sammich.

2) Calm the fuck down.

3) Get on with some homework.

4) Stay away from the little brown beans!

roflrofl

I Feel Sick :S

BLLLAAAAARRRRGGGHHHHH.

THAT's how the last couple of weeks has gone.

I'm not even sure I want to write. I really would like to just beat my head against a brick wall and then sleep for a very long time.

I seemed to decide somewhere around the start of last week that it didn't matter. I was half off the bandwaggon and meaning to get more serious with myself again. And then a whole bunch of SHIT happened and I decided FUCK IT, I'll get back on the bandwaggon AFTER I've sorted all this shit out, and in the meantime I don't give a flying fuck.

So I went to town on myself. I have a massive scab in the middle of my chin that's been there all week, and every day I tell myself I'm going to leave it alone and let it heal now, and every day I rip it off my face before ten AM. And the rest ain't so prettty either.

I'm so pissed off right now. I think I really need to go hit something. Writing this is not making me feel any better. Just more frustrated.

It's not even the kind of pissed off that is going to keep me away from the mirror tonight. If anything, it's the kind that's going to keep me going back.

And tweezers. They've come back out too. I told myself that I would do it instead of picking, but that's a fucking lie. It was calm and controlled, at first. And then I got myself into such a frenzy that my hands were shaking and I couldn't aim properly or pluck fast enough and there was SO FUCKING MUCH OF IT and it ALL HAD TO FUCKING GO and then I had to drop the tweezers and run out of the bathroom because I was going so crazy with frustration at not being able to do it fast enough that I thought I might just end up stabbing myself with them and that would not have been good.

It's okay to tweeze, I told myself to start with, it's a good distraction from picking, just don't let it become as much of a problem as picking is, and you'll be fine. And here I am on a Monday afternoon, hiding in my parent's bathroom, making crazy screaming noises inside my head about ripping my whole groin out with a pair of tweezers.

How the fuck am I here? After everything, after all this time and effort, after believing I was mostly on top of this, HOW THE FUCK AM I HERE?

Repairing the Mirror Relationship?

Wow, I got a comment from Maysun, my first ever! Thanks Maysun ^__^ It sure did perk me up to read that. It was good advice too – I can’t believe now that I didn’t even think about the mirrors in the changing rooms. Maybe if I had been better prepared mentally, I wouldn’t have slipped up.

I tried something on Tuesday that I think worked rather well. I was going out to dinner with all my work friends and was doing hair, putting on make-up etc, and of course I needed the mirror to do that. I thought about using a small hand-mirror in a dimly-lit room, but then decided to adopt another tactic instead. I closed the door of the bathroom cabinet (I have been keeping it open so the mirror in the door isn’t showing), I looked at my reflection, and I deliberately made myself look for things I liked about what I saw.

I like my eyes. They are a greeny-brown – my mother calls them hazel – and they are really pretty and unusual. I like my mouth; it’s pale pink and quite little, almost a button-mouth. My chin is small and pointy, giving my face a heart-shaped effect. A cute little pixie-chin. My freckles are just noticeable under my eyes and along my hairline.

I spent about fifteen or twenty seconds just logging all of this mentally, all these things I liked about my face. And then I started doing my hair and my make-up. Every time I found myself drawn towards an imperfection, I would pull myself back to finding things I liked.

I didn’t pick. I was in front of that mirror for about ten to fifteen minutes, and I did not pick.

I did the same yesterday morning and this morning when doing my hair for work, and both times went well. I practised saying to myself, out loud, “You are beautiful.” Telling myself aloud all the things I liked about my face. I felt a little stupid. But it seemed to work.

I mostly still keep the mirrors out of sight, because I still have a lot of impulses to look for the wrong reasons. But I’m hoping this can be some kind of ‘repairing my relationship with mirrors’ therapy that will help me to cope when I go back home on Sunday, to the bathroom mirror that I can’t do anything about.

On the other hand, I am a little worried that this is just some half-baked scheme that I am using as an excuse to look at my reflection when I really didn’t ought to let myself do it at all. But – life is a learning curve, ne? If it leads me back to picking, I’ll know it was the wrong thing to do, and then I won’t do it again.

So. Feeling positive!

Easy Good, Easy Bad

Okay. Bungalow review time.

I have actually been pleasantly surprised at how easy I have found it to be good over the last eight days. When I came here for a fortnight last February, I was desperately trying to quit picking, but had not been working at it for long and was still finding it extremely difficult – also I had not yet found dtM on Wikipedia or the lovely SPOM board; those discoveries came in March. So, in short, this time last year I sucked mighty ass at not picking during my fortnight at the bungalow. In fourteen days I don’t believe I hit more than four stickers.

As I recall, I think I did cover the mirrors back then, but gave in to the compulsion to ‘check how my skin was doing’ all too frequently, which led to the compulsion to pick. This time it’s been different. I put the mirrors away, and left them alone. I get urges to look at my reflection, sure, but it’s not like it was a year ago. I just say ‘no’ inside my head, and go and do something else.

On Saturday, I went on a mega clothes shopping spree. I’ve needed to for a while; I had gotten desperately short of smart clothes for work. I went into the first shop, psyching myself up for a long day of shopping ahead – I don’t particularly love shopping to be honest, it’s so time-consuming trying everything on and it starts to annoy me after an hour or so. But anyway, I grabbed a load of things I liked the look of, headed for the fitting rooms, locked the cubicle door behind me…

And was confronted by my reflection for the first time in a week. Oh god. How had this failed to occur to me? I was going to be spending a very large part of the day locked in private little spaces with mirrors all over the god damn walls.

I took a deep breath, and tried everything on very fast. I was sharply aware of a spot on my cheek that I had managed to mostly ignore for the last couple of days. It was screaming at me in my head, and the mirror felt like gravity.

I looked. I looked very closely, but I did not touch. I was good.

Next shop. Another mirror. I looked again. I touched it, briefly. I closed my fingertips around it, and then snatched them away. I would do this. I would beat this. I would not give in.

Next shop. Looking. Touching. And then it was happening and I knew I should stop but somehow I didn’t, and then it was all over and a raised red blotch was all that was left.

Damn it all to hell.

I couldn’t believe it. I had been doing SO well! And then a mirror had happened, and my resolve had utterly fallen apart. I knew that covering the mirrors would be a help. But it wasn’t until then that I realised how easy it was to do well when there were no mirrors, and how easy it was to fall down when a mirror was put in front of me.

All the good that I am doing here in the bungalow is going to count for nothing when I get back home, if I cannot find a way to fight the mirrors. Because I cannot get away from them there. And I will fall down again and again and again, when I could be doing so well, if only those fucking mirrors weren’t there!

How the hell do I work around this? How?