Skin Deep

Last night I could hear my mom calling me downstairs to open my presents. "Hold on!" I replied from the bathroom. I continued to press as hard as I could, fingernails sinking into tender flesh. The sight of blood vessels bursting under the skin did not deter me. My cheek stung and turned a bright raw pink. But I could not stop. I HAD to get it out...

I wish to share something which I have told no-one about before. Even my closest friends would only vaguely know about it, unaware of the full picture. And as I turn 23 today, I feel that letting this out will be a good start to getting older.

It all started when I was 14, when my big sister called me into her room. “I want to show you something. Come really close…” She placed her fingers on my nose and I felt a small pinch. She showed me a yellowish substance on her fingernail.

“There! That’s a blackhead.” She explained. “They are the little black dots on your skin. It’s dirt and oil that is clogging your pores.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. It’s gross, right?”

“I went to the mirror and looked at my face. There were little black dots all around my nose. I decided to give it a go myself and consequently sealed my fate.

I suffer from a behavioral condition called Dermatillomania. It’s linked to, or is a possible strain of Body Dysmorphic Disorder or Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. It causes the patient to create ‘neurotic excoriations’, or self-inflicted wounds by picking, scratching, digging or peeling.

In my case, the body part that suffers the most is my face. I can spend hours at a time almost every day in front of any accessible mirror: pressing, prodding, squeezing any pock marks and possible imperfections. The moment I start, I fall into a dissociative state – almost like a trance, where I lose all track of time and place. If I am lucky, I snap out of it at the bark of a dog, or the sound of someone coming up the stairs, but most of the time I end up resuming what I’m doing. By the end of a skin-picking session, my face is swollen with red marks which may stay for days. A lot of the time, I end up attacking something that was never there, ironically resulting in blemishes I was aiming to get rid of to begin with. There has never been a time when my face does not have at least one scab or inflammation from my own doing. The scars that form are deep and visible up close.


I have a naturally good complexion, so I don’t know the real reason why I do it. Maybe it is the challenge of removing something so unbelievably small and almost unattainable. It could be the notion that my face is infested with impurities that ruin my skin, and I feel that the most effective way to feel perfect is to make sure that every pore on my face is clean. It could be that I use the pain as refuge from negative thoughts, from anger, sorrow or plain stress. It could be all, and even more. What I do know for sure is that immediately after every session, I feel immense guilt and self-hatred wrenching up my insides. I feel worse than I’ve ever been… damaged, fragile and worthless.

When my mom first found out about my bad habit, she told me off and from then on, threw words at me like ‘neurotic’, ‘weak-minded’ and ‘abnormal’. I knew there was something wrong about doing it from the very beginning, but I was in denial, and the urges were uncontrollable. In school, I would come to class with large, hideous scabs covering my nose. I found it hard to look at friends and teachers in the face. As the years went on, I ‘graduated’ to other areas of the face: my forehead, cheeks, chin, jawline, eyebrows, and even the corners of my mouth. Every nook and cranny.

A year into the disorder, I followed my mother to her visit to the dermatologist. I wanted to see if I was able to seek professional help. In the consultation room, I described my problem to Dr. Tan. She gave me a scornful glare, and said, “You know what is wrong with you? NO time management, and NO discipline!” She started lecturing me about how to live my life as though she knew me from birth. She shot me down like a groveling runt. My mother, sitting next to me, egged her on and said she couldn’t have agreed more to every comment. I had never felt so humiliated in my life. I was so close to leaving the room, but being the submissive teenager I was, all I could bring myself to do was nod and smile like it was nothing. The encounter left me scarred, figuratively and literally. From that day on, I knew I was on my own.

The only other person outside the family who was fully aware of my problem was my first boyfriend in 2002. He didn’t understand why I did it, but he knew that it was affecting me on a profound level. I started wearing layers of makeup to college. At times I was so ashamed of myself, I couldn’t even stand having face-to-face conversations. All his attempts to keep me from doing it failed. One day he cupped my face in his hands. “Why do you do this to yourself? Stop, please stop…” His voice was shivering with desperation. All I could do was look back at him through tears and be lost for an answer.

I am often told that I have ‘nice skin’, even by skin centre consultants. I never know how to react to it. Little do people know the pain I've gone through to hide the truth. Every time I get complimented, whether on my face alone or my overall appearance, it makes me hate myself even more, because of the pointless abuse I inflict on my body. It makes me wonder if I truly deserve what God has given me as a vessel for my being. The pangs of low self-esteem force me to run to the nearest mirror, and the vicious cycle continues.

Only recently did I find out that what I have been suffering from is an actual disorder. On a whim, I searched the words ‘skin picking’ on the internet last year. I was shocked to come across countless medical websites that documented cases of dermatillomania. I matched all the symptoms. I read a torrent of comments made by girls in my exact position, who had no idea they were not suffering alone. I finally gave in to my denial; with it came a wave of relief.

I have heard of simple solutions: Don't spend more time in the bathroom than you have to. Keep the lights off if possible. Invest in high-quality beauty products. Always give yourself something to do. Such suggestions only relate to avoiding the stimulus and temporary alleviations, but they don’t tackle the problem head on. From now on I am trying to get through this through sheer will power and changing my frame of mind. It has been hard but I know I will get there eventually. Those not in my shoes may wonder how something so easy as quitting can be made into such a groundbreaking task. But just like any other vice, it is not. I have become emotionally and physiologically dependent. It consumes me like a drug. It has been doing so for almost ten years.

By making this confession, I am not looking for help, sympathy or attention. I instead want to shed light on a serious matter that is often conveniently shrugged off as a trivial habit that can be quickly fixed. I hope that others who are also facing what I am going through will know that there is nothing wrong with sharing it with others; if anything, I hope that it will help them realize that the condition can be overcome, because I know that doing so has sure helped me.

My birthday wish is for people to stop making judgements about those who may be so easily misunderstood... For all girls to not just believe, but know that they are beautiful, no matter what the beauty magazines say.

That, and also for me to enjoy a mean slice of tiramisu tonight.