Skin Deep (Warning: I'm out of Selfie Control) in Current Events

I think that I am about to break a world record for the most amount of selfies in one Prosebox entry

I have a fantasy about me becoming a writer. I have a lot of great stories that I want to tell. I have a lot of things that I want to say. In my mind writing was going to be my side hustle. The rest of my fantasies require me to be in front of a lens. Once upon a time, there was a young queen named Tom. He applied to a modelling agency because everybody told him that he should. The agency wanted him to do acting gigs and they offered to pay for a couple of lessons because they were excited about his look. He got crazy insecure about his long painful battle with cystic acne and so he turned down that offer. He convinced himself that he would fix his face first. They didn’t bring it up at the go-see, his skin, but he was so sure that they would have had a conversation about it if he was to get hired by the agency. That was a conversation that he didn’t want to have. He was somewhat, in denial. He used makeup to cover it up and that was like a face mask for him. He didn’t want the world to see the real him.

The modelling gig is not at all what people think it is anyway. I would have just accumulated debt all over the world. Honestly, I probably would have been hired for plenty of gigs because of the brand that the agency wanted to give me. “First nations models are in high demand but your people are usually… well you know.” However, the acting could have been fun. I still have that fantasy in the back of my mind somewhere. I won my battle against cystic acne since then but it won the war. I’m left with a lot of acne scars. A lot of first nations men, especially in my family, have horrible horrible acne scars and mine are not at that level, thank god. I assume it is because they never quit dairy as I have. The scarring is still bad though. Up until the end of 2018, I was getting Pixelated Laser Treatments and Impulse Laser Treatments to help with the scarring. I’ve told this story on here a million times but I heard about another procedure called Subcision in which they use a needle to scrape under the skin to break up the scar tissue. I went and had a consultation for that procedure and the woman I spoke with destroyed my self-esteem to absolute filth.

She basically said that my expectations are the problem, I will never get rid of these scars. Treatments only help reduce their appearance and the best treatments are not available to me because of my ethnicity, I could end up with the wrong pigmentation. Man, I am still trying to recover that blow. I stopped getting the Pixel and IPL because the situation is just hopeless, apparently. I since then bought a Dermaroll and a PMD kit just to feel like I am doing something about it. Between the treatments and products that I have purchased, I do have some pretty decent results. When the lighting is good, there are some scars that I can’t even see but I live in some pretty bad lighting. Opening up the camera on my phone is the absolute worse. The angle and lighting are just… I cringe every single time. I don’t look at mirrors, I never look at photos that my friends take with me. All the photos I post of me are, of course, photoshopped to filth. I don’t want to call this an obsession but I am constantly studying the quality of people’s skin. When I watch TV & movies my self-esteem always loses some HP. I’m like “wow, I’m so jealous. Look at the texture of their skin. I could never be in that lighting. I should wear a paper bag. It’s not fair that people can just walk around and not have to think about how awful their face is to look at.” All the while I am aware of how beauty standards are set impossibly high and that we all have insecurities.

I feel like I am living with a deformity. I can’t be intimate with somebody because I can’t stomach the thought of somebody touching my face. Meeting people who only see me online is another nightmare, I can’t help but be aware that I look nothing like my photos. I’m always conscious of it. Always. When people stare at me in public, I assume that they are starring at my scars. Maybe they are, maybe they aren’t. It’s so awful that I am so concerned about my appearance but I can’t help it. I’ve put so many dreams on hold because of a lame belief that I will be good enough one day. A belief that was crushed by that woman who told me that my expectations are the problem. She’s absolutely right but I don’t know how to accept that. A couple of years ago I had a dream about becoming an “influencer”. I wanted to start a YouTube channel, grow my Instagram etc. I wanted to document my hair growth journey, my minoxidil journey, my skin journey, my fitness journey, my self-help journey etc… blah. I just don’t have the self-esteem for looking at myself but I feel that I could, I dunno, inspire people who look like me, think like me, who can relate to me etc. I don’t know anybody out there like me. I wish that I could just throw caution to the wind and just do it. I suppose that I am the story that I want to tell? I really am self-centred and conceded I guess. I suppose that this entry got away from me a bit. I started to talk about my dream to write stories to… this sad topic.

I’ve been pretty vulnerable in the last few entries I feel. So while I’m at it, I’ll share an obscene amount of selfies. My “image journery”?? I don’t know what to call this series of unfortunate events.
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Here Goes

Here I am inventing the selfie in 2004. I was 17-21 and these were my selfies from my Myspace days. I hooked my webcam up to my bathroom mirror and I used my foot to use my laptop as a pedal to snap the shot. Then I used Microsoft Paint to edit them lol

Here I am in my early to mid twenties “modelling” and making people want to buy shit and stuff… just kidding. My friend was learning how to be a photographer and makeup artist and we occasionally took headshots and played around with my wardrobe.

Smartphones changed the game. Here I am in my mid to late twenties. I played around once in a while and I had some fun with taking selfies. Everybody was doing it. Some editing apps were available so I got a little less afraid of the camera.

When I turned 30 I decided to reinvent my image. I wanted to become “more masculine” and now I don’t know how to break out of it. It’s so toxic. I also attempted to grow my Instagram but nobody liked anything that wasn’t a selfie. Not my paintings, photography, poetry or recipes lol. I became another social media-obsessed millennial and that became crazy toxic for me. I’ve never hated myself so much in my life. I removed all of my content & I deactivated everything on October 4th 2018 and broke free. I want to return one day when it is safe to do so. I have a minimal presence on Instagram and Snapchat now. Baby steps lol. Some of these actually never made it to social media and are actually only a few weeks old. Sometimes I just want to feel my oats.

I know that I look like I am obsessed with myself when I clump 15 years worth of these pictures together. Editing these images was super not healthy. Making myself look unreal, I can’t even look in a mirror. I have to have a few drinks to even sit through editing them. I have been struggling with my image and identity for decades now.

I saw a RuPaul quote yesterday that really spoke to me. When the going gets tough, the tough reinvent themselves. When I asked my friend Jen to teach me how to dye my hair using salon dye, I also asked her for advice about cutting my hair again. She asked if I was ready and my answer was no. I just feel pressured a bit. I am pressuring myself, I feel like a makeover could help me shed my skin so to speak. Let go of the last 5 months of unemployment. Help me get over the job loss from a job that I had for 13 years. A job that defined me for 13 years. It took up so much space in my life and now it’s all gone. I used to always say that if you can’t put your best foot forward put on your best shoe. I think that a little makeover will give me the little kick in my step that I need to help me embrace this next chapter in my life. The chapter I haven’t even started to write because I am so crippled with fear. My life is so small right now and I want to make it so very big. I’m holding myself back. I’m turning into a broken record in these last few weeks but I can’t… stop.

I think I need to find something better to do right now that whine on Prosebox.
ta

Last updated September 03, 2019