Pretty in Pink? Learning to Love Your Complexion
I’m really pretty pink. Of course, there are triggers that worsen it, like standing on my head for too long, or red wine, or sending embarrassing text messages. But even when I wake up after a deeply restful nine-hour sleep, I tend to be a little bit flushed.
For a long time I didn’t really think about it. I didn’t wear much makeup, so color-matching wasn’t an issue, and I grew up around a lot of other Irish kids, so they were kind of pink, too. At some point, though, I started thinking about the color of my skin as a problem that had to be fixed. Indeed, my pink skin had become the thing I hated most about my appearance.
It started when a famous dermatologist, who I went to see for an annual skin exam, walked in the room, took one look at me, and said “Okay, so the rosacea. There’s a new pill out…” as she reached for her prescription pad and started scribbling.
That was the first time my pinkness had been “diagnosed,” and it was the first time it occurred to me that it wasn’t stray blemishes or moles I had to worry about, but my whole entire face.
I’d never heard of rosacea, and the last thing I wanted to do was take a pill for a problem I didn’t even know I had. I left her office feeling horrible (and hideous).
It’s hard to explain, but there is something about being told your whole freaking face is a problem that really kind of stings. Since then, I’ve had makeup artists suggest I prime my entire face with something tinted green; I’ve been prescribed topical steroids; I’ve had estheticians suggest expensive five-packs of “cool” lasers; I’ve had ayurvedic doctors forbid me from eating tomatoes for four months; and I’ve had makeup-counter people point me to lines for women with “rosy undertones” by Clinique or Origins. There are even infomericals on TV for skin like mine.
In our book, we interview Evan Healy, a holistic esthetitian who has a skincare line that we really like. She talks a lot about rosacea, and how common it has become, suggesting that the widespread use of aggressive peels and acids has resulted in an increase in the number of women with red, irritated skin. Even Alexandra, who is anything but pink, battled with redness a few years ago when she was still using acids on her face and getting regular facials.
But here’s the thing. I don’t do that stuff, and I never really did. Over the past two years, I have completely detoxed my skincare regimen, I am incredibly gentle with my face, I am careful about what I put in and on my body, and yeah, sure, my skin has calmed down a little. But it’s still totally pink. And I still have doctors suggesting I fix it with topicals and drugs.
This isn’t life or death stuff, of course, but these are nonetheless the things we all live with—our own impressions of our own appearance, based on personal hangups as well as what we are told is pretty. And for whatever reason, this one has been the hardest for me to make peace with.
And yet…I kind of have. It’s part of what this natural-beauty thing is all about for Alexandra and me. Somehow, along the way, your perspective shifts, and you stop feeling like your hair, or your skin, or your body are things that need to be tamed and molded into submission. You learn to smile when doctors give you bad advice, because you know your skin better than they do, and you trust yourself. And then you go stand on your head for as long as you want, and you eat tomatoes because they’re delicious, and you send those embarrassing text messages. Sure, your face turns pink as hell, except now, you really, truly don’t care.
What has been your biggest hurdle?
Beautiful girl via
Whats wrong with a rosey hue? Why must it be a ‘problem’ at all? Own it, rock it, love it.
When I was just a baby my mom’s best friend turned to her and said: “We’ll get her a nose job for her 16th birthday.” Ouch! But over time I’ve learned to love my funny nose… Some days. :)
My skin is probably my single greatest hurdle.
It’s taken a loooong time to get to the point where I love my curves. Hopefully the skin thing is just around the corner!!
Love this! I am part Irish, pretty pink and have been diagnosed with Rosacea too. I’ve been on the path of embracing it for a while — after exercise, I tell my husband to call me Princess Pretty Pink Cheeks. (and I am the OPPOSITE of princessy… )
Thank you for this post. We all need to embrace what’s different about us, rather than pummeling it into conformity. Yay pink cheeks!
If everyone could learn to love the skin their in, we would all be so much healthier. I’m prone to redness (from underlying autoimmune issues) and it always stings when I go for a facial and they ask me what I do to care for it. But I am happy just using “clean” organic skin care products and being completely make up free ninety-five percent of the time- there is something so wonderfully freeing about not trying to hide every blemish.
My biggest hurdle – I am a mammal. My skin tone is very light, but my body hair is dark. Therefore people have harassed me about being “hairy” my entire life. I can’t tell you how many nights I spent crying over it during my teen years, but somewhere around the time I got all yoga-fied I guess I made my peace with it… and I refuse to wax – that is crazy. I don’t obsess over it anymore, and I love myself… Hair and All.
The acne. Need I say more? :(
Thank you for this article. I have had rosy checks all my life and when exercising or wine or spicy foods.. heat.. it gets more rosey.. then I at some point it turned into what they call rosacea & I had the same thing happen to me. I felt like something was wrong with my face since it was clear and not pink. I have gone totally to using things out of the kitchen to clean and moisturizer my face. My face is the clearest that it has been in I dont know how long and its keeps getting clearer. I am sure in 6 months there will be more change. I eat healthy most of the time and have started working out again. I am looking into doing my hair the no poo way. I use vinegar now. I dont spend crazy amounts on the rosacea products. I am sure the clean brands are worth the money. To spend that amount seems crazy and I can budget that for my face.. I am happy and the No More Dirty Books has definitely given me the ability to start becoming comfortable in my skin and this article is awesome.
thanks,
Connie
I am very fair skinned, with very dark hair, eyebrows and lashes. As I child I had rather large lips and bushy dark eyebrows. I was teased by my peers, especially the boys, so I was always self-conscious and used to try to hide both the brows and the lips, with bangs and by sucking my lips in, (makes for always having chapped lips, sigh). Then came Brook Shields, Nastasia Kinski and Isabella Rosellini. I felt, for the first time, that I wasn’t a freak and I wasn’t doomed and I loved it!.
I also learned to appreciate my “imperfections”, my skin tone and all around coloring when I had my children. They inherited them all and there wasn’t one thing wrong with them. In fact, that porcelain skin looked pretty damn good on them.
I hate my freckles, but I’m trying to come to peace with them. I’m almost there with my breasts but I’ve completely come to peace with my nose – I actually love it now.
this brought a tear to my eye!! i am very pale, and a pinky, and i love this article! THANK YOU SO MUCH SIOBHAN!
my biggest issues now? redness in the skin-blemishes, scares, acne… my weight (eating healthy, exercising- so I can feel good about my Swedish curves), and getting my thin, flat, crazy hair to be healthy and to love it for its thin, flat, crazy self. I used to be so embarrassed by my near albino white skin, and now i love it.
and i have these issues, why? because i am lazy and let myself get stressed. hey, i am a never-ending work-in-progress… ever changing and improving… right? right. =)
scars…
Freckles. I have major amounts of freckles. With a background of German, Irish, and Russian, I suppose it was bound to happen. The trouble is I’m half Filipina as well. For most of my life I grew up around a great many Asian-skinned-people who have no freckles or moles of any kind while I am absolutely loaded.
Unfortunately I had similar experiences with dermatologists who tsk-tsked me incessantly upon entering their offices. “You should be more careful and stay out of the sun!” Well, I was born in Florida. I live in Florida now. It is a sun obsessed culture. I always took their advice to heart and wore thick shields of sunscreens (loaded with a variety of toxics I have since learned) and hats and suffered in long sleeves. I’m sure my future skin will thank me but these practices never decreased the amount of spotting along my arms and face and legs. The admonishments worsened as I entered my twenties and, instead of being seen as natural micro-sized areas of increased pigmentation, my freckles became targets for pitches of laser therapy and any number of chemical peels designed to erase them from my life.
I’ve spent thousands on a slew of lightening creams and exfoliants each promising to even out my skin tone. And while a few have certainly lightened the spots, none of them have buffed them out of existence. Worse, all the exfoliants led to cranky skin and then I had red spots of acne intermixed with the freckling.
It’s taken years to get this point (I’ll be twenty-eight tomorrow!) but I’m finally at peace with the spots. I can’t claim to have come to this enlightenment all on my own but learning about toxics and cosmetics over the past few years as a quest to green my life (I studied wildlife conservation in school) certainly led me to the door to accepting my complexion and to finish forever torturing it with “treatments” for an ailment I don’t truly possess.
What has helped more is seeing the acceptance for “uneven” skin in magazines and on models much more frequently in the past year. Perhaps they were always there and I’m just more aware of their presence, but it always seemed to me in my teenage years that every model and covergirl had creamy consistent skin with nary a spot in sight. Lucy Liu’s freckles made me smile in “Charlie’s Angels” and I was absolutely in love with the freckling across Sienna Miller’s nose in a movie recently. While I sat in the theatre watching her it dawned on me: Ummmm, I have those!
I suppose it is silly and girly to admit but – more than anything else – hearing from men I love that freckles are irresistible also helped to change my perspective. What woman wouldn’t want to hear that a trait she thinks odd is actually just extraordinary?
i’m also an Asian with freckles, which is really uncommon. when i go back to Taiwan, people keep telling me to stay out of the sun and the available laser treatments – as if i’m going to stay out of the sun!
i developed a skin condition called vitiligo when i was around 10. although it isn’t as severe as many cases, i always thought i was ugly, especially since it turned some of my hair white. i’m only just coming to terms with it as i grow older.
What amazing comments. Thank you all for sharing! I have to say, I have freckles too, and when I was in the fourth grade I wrote a poem with my friend Simone about washing them off my face (she has freckles too). I now love my freckles on the days that I don’t hate them :)
Check out the comment from Samala. So pro-freckle!
I can relate. Once I went to one of those makeup parties. The person who gave me the makeover told me that my skin was really red and I needed a bottle of green tint. Foolishly I bought it. After using it I realized that my skin had no color to it. I looked like a vampire.
I try to just ignore people’s comments about my rosy skin.
Oily Skin :(
I find the freckle thing so interesting because I have always been so jealous if people with freckles! In fact in sixth grade I was leaving for school when my mom asked me what was on my face. I shrugged nonchalantly and gave her my best wide eyed innocent look. Is it my fault the brown eyeliner I snuck from her bag didn’t make for convincing freckles??
Now I’m ok with my “ordinary” peachy mostly pink complexion. But i treasure those 8 freckles on each shoulder! I consider it a compromise.
I have a friend who’s Danish/Irish and she has the rosiest cheeks I’ve ever seen. People tried to tell her she had rosacea, but her skin wasn’t irritable or anything–and it was only her cheeks anyway. It was just her skin. And it’s damn cute too! I have a bit of pink/peach to my skin (ah, the British Isles blood in me!), and my derm told me I had “slight rosacea” but it’s not something I’m too worried about. I prefer this to being sallow and having to wear blush.
Probably my body shape is what I’ve had to come to terms with. I was always skinny, even scrawny, as a kid, and then I hit puberty and it was like BAM boobs and hips. But now I love my hourglass figure. although I have to do a lot of boob-control before doing anything athletic.