Taking off the mask(s)

During this pandemic we have all had to get used to wearing masks of one sort or another, whether we like it or not. Here in the UK I personally wish there was more of an ethos for wearing masks in order to protect others, particularly the most vulnerable in our communities so that opening up isn’t something that is exclusive only to those of us who are NOT extremely clinically vulnerable. Instead we have a culture of individualism and ‘personal responsibility’, something that encourages us to only consider ourselves and our own individual circumstances. As someone who has caring responsibilities for my father (who is elderly and extremely clinically vulnerable) I won’t be taking off my FFP2 mask anytime soon. However, this doesn’t mean that wearing face masks hasn’t been an issue for me and many others like me who suffer from a range of skin conditions including rosacea, bouts of acne and skin picking disorder. For those individual like me, wearing masks has presented huge challenges.

Throughout this pandemic I have worn masks for the primary reason of wanting to keep my father safe. This has had some difficult and unexpected outcomes. Primarily, and most noticeably, wearing a mask has completely messed up my ability to wear make-up without it getting smudged off every time I remove my mask. For those of you who may think this is ultra-trivial, I ask you to consider this from my perspective.

For as long as I can remember I have hated my skin. I have rosacea - my skin is prone to redness and blushing and so every microscopic flicker of emotion is projected onto my face for the world to see and to judge. I can recall one lesson when I was in secondary school where the teacher cruelly drew the attention of the entire classroom to my skin by saying “you could fry eggs on those cheeks”. I was mortified and of course, my skin grew even redder so it felt like my face was on fire. I was cloaked in shame and sat there in silent horror, unable to look at anyone or anything for the rest of the lesson. (This was definitely NOT the worst experience of my school days, but perhaps I may feel brave enough to share that trauma another time.)

Due to a long history of an eating disorder which affected my hormonal levels and my ability to menstruate for five years I have since been inflicted with adult acne. Through many, many years of futilely attempting to discover the ‘cause’ of this I have been able to attribute it to a number of food intolerances, but I firmly believe that my acne is primarily brought on by stress.

So, combine redness with severe blushing with bouts of acne (and I won’t even go into the skin picking in this blog*) and well…I have developed what feels like an intense paranoia about what my skin looks like. Wearing make-up has always felt to me like an immense relief, a mask that I can don to allow me to go out into the world without people seeing that my skin is red, blushing or indeed, imperfect. Wearing an actual face mask due to Covid, has completely fucked this up for me.

I’m sure there are foundations out there that are mask-resistant and maybe I should have pursued investigating them. But I haven’t. Instead I have slowly been trying to decrease the amount of foundation I have been using, with the thought that ‘well, it’s going to all come off anyway…’. I have recently switched to a different foundation that I had brought several years ago but abandoned because the coverage is somewhere between crap to non-existent. I am wearing it now despite the fact that I could probably not even bother to because it really looks no different from my natural skin. I think psychologically it feels reassuring to be wearing foundation, even one with crap coverage. There’s a part of myself that just can’t bear to go completely ‘naked’ with my skin.

As trivial as this may seem to some, I can assure you that pre-pandemic there is no way in hell I would have considered being seen without my foundation mask. Absolutely no fucking way. Not even by the postman. Not even by myself even on days where I don’t have to leave my house. So for me, being forced to wear a mask that effectively removed another mask has been well, life changing. When I spoke about this with my therapist (who I actually got to see recently in real life at her home for the first time in a year and a half) she said it made her ‘want to dance around the room’. She didn’t, but I think she was thrilled all the same.

As someone who has always been intensely personal, introverted and extremely hesitant about letting people into my life I guess you could say that in a sense I am taking off another kind of mask as well. A metaphorical one that keeps others at bay. In all honesty I don’t think I will ever become an open book but through these blogposts I am attempting to be more open, more honest and more real about the issues in my life that weave themselves into my paintings.

 *to read the blogpost about skin picking disorder read here.