Most people have a healthy relationship with makeup. They start with a little mascara and eyeliner and gradually add products as they feel comfortable. For most people, this evolution is driven simply by their own desire. People who like wearing makeup wear it and those that don't, for whatever reason, don't. Most people's relationship with makeup isn't a big deal; unfortunately I am not one of those people.
A few months ago, a Facebook friend shared an article about makeup and self-esteem. Generally the article was saying that although there is a boost in self-esteem while wearing makeup, the toll of then taking the makeup off makes putting it on not worth it. This article pointed out something that I had always been aware of but never really thought about. Most days (to be fair it's really a lot closer to every day), I fall asleep wearing the makeup from that day. I am well aware of how awful this is for my skin, but it's a combination of laziness and not wanting to take the makeup off that makes up this bad habit. You see, if I wait until the next morning to take it off, then I take it off seconds before I put new makeup on, greatly reducing the amount of time spent with no makeup on.
I was certainly not always like this. I was not allowed to wear makeup at all until I hit high school and for three years I stuck to either nothing or a little bit of eyeliner and mascara. Many of my friends wore makeup and had the eyeliner and mascara if I wanted to wear it. The thing was, I just didn't. I liked sleeping in and I really didn't have a lot of time in the mornings. Breakfast beat makeup on the list of what was the most important thing to happen in my busy mornings. I just didn't have the time or desire to wear lots of makeup.
Beginning the end of my junior year, I wore eyeliner and mascara daily. I was wearing glasses and I liked the way that it looked. It made me happy and a little more confident to wear it. It wasn't super hard or time consuming and it wasn't all over my face.
Sometime during the summer after my junior year I was grumbling about my left eyebrow. It does this annoying thing where it sticks up. My mom said something about how it always did that, and asked if I was going to do something about it. My answer was no; I told her that it didn't really bother me. I said that no one else would possibly care about it, so why should I bother? A few months later I would think back to that conversation and laugh through my tears. How young and naive I was to assume that no one cared about what my eyebrows looked like.
During the fall of my senior year, I found out that someone, whose opinion used to mean a lot to me, trashed my physical appearance. A few of my friends had found out about it and I begged them to tell me what was said. It took a lot to get it out of them but once you mention something like that you can't really expect to not have to tell all the details. I don't think I have the words to describe what it feels like to hear something like that. I felt as though I had the wind knocked out of me. I was out to dinner at the time so I did my best to hold it together but as soon as I was by myself, I sobbed.
I got home and looked at myself in the mirror: all of a sudden all the parts of my face that I had used to be okay with, I was no longer happy with. It was as if the face I had become used to seeing in the mirror was completely different. My eyebrows that I had never considered perfect were suddenly so hideous they had to go right then. I had never found fault with my skin itself but all of a sudden, I found all the little impurities repulsive. My nose, which is large and a little crooked, became the ugliest nose I had ever seen. My brown eyes stopped being big and beautiful and were transformed to drab and unfortunate. My face itself had not physically changed at all but the way I saw it changed completely.
Immediately, I found the tweezers and pulled up instructions on pinterest on how to pluck your eyebrows. If I wasn't already out of tears, I would have cried then. The skin around my eyes did not like being plucked at all. It took ages, but I was very determined. It was a practice I would continue just about every week. It was one of my least favorite activites on the planet but the way I saw it my only alternative was going to a salon and having them rip the hairs out with hot wax, something I was not yet willing to do.
About a month and a half after this, I walked into Ulta for the second time in my entire life. The first time was to buy sparkly eyeshadow for Halloween, which I feel really sums up my makeup experience. This time I was in on a completely different mission. I walked in and stared around. For anyone who has never been there before, it is completely overwhelming. Finally, after spending several minutes wandering around like a lost puppy dog, I got the courage to ask someone working there for help. The conversation went something like this:
Me: "Um hi, I... a... think ... um... I need help."
Sales associate: "Hi, what do you need help with today?"
Me: "Um ... just about ... everything."
Sales associate: "Well okay, let's get started then!"
They assigned a lovely young woman to help me, and together we went through everything from liquid eyeliner to eyeshadow palettes to foundation. I had no clue there was a different primer for your eye lids than your face or that you should put finishing powder on before your mascara but after your eyeliner. It was a whole new world for me. I was in there for several hours and left with the most expensive little bag of my life.
After that I wore makeup almost all the time. The whole process of putting it all on took at least fifteen minutes of my morning (although I did get faster with practice) and it was more important than breakfast or getting to school on time. It got to the point that I wouldn't send a snapchat without makeup on. I was no longer happy to with my face. I was applying more and more makeup to hide my insecurities with my own face and skin.
Now a year and a half later, I'm pretty comfortable not wearing makeup in college, but the minute I get back home it all goes back on. Earlier this week I went to a hair salon for the first time for a wax — I was too tired of tweezing. It wasn't the worst experience of my entire life, but it was by no means fun. I miss the days when I could look in the mirror without complaint for face I saw. It's amazing how fragile the perception you have of yourself really is. It's weird to think back to the girl who was happy with the way she looked, who honestly believed she was beautiful and who thought that no one cared that her eyebrows weren't perfect.
