Uncategorized – That's Just Life

The Impact of Makeup on Disability Perception

“You look perfectly healthy”

“You are too young”

“You need to do x work out”

“You need to do x diet”

“Have you done ____?”

It’s always “you” this “you” that. Have “you” taken x supplement, or have “you” seen x doctor. I know people mean well and I am okay with getting unsolicited advice. I always take the advice who knows maybe one of those tips will come in handy one day. Maybe that migraine that one time did just need some water to go away. Maybe if I see x doctor, maybe that doctor will find the answers to all of my questions. Maybe something in your advice is the answer to my problems. I will never turn down people being kind and just wanting to help.

What truly hurts is not being believed because “You look too young to be disabled” “You look great today, see it wasn’t that bad” “So pretty, no way you can feel that bad today”. My favorite one…”You are lazy” All true statements that have been said to me. What does being young, or pretty or having a good hair day, or wearing make up have to do with being disabled or in pain. One has nothing to do with the other but yet it does for even the medical professionals. I love playing with make up and dressing up even on my crappiest days. If I feel like crap all over, at least when I see the outside I won’t feel as bad seeing myself look crappy. Makes sense?

I recently asked in a forum online. As someone with Chronic conditions/pain when you go to a doctors appointment, do you where the lipstick or not? The responses were all over the place. It depends if it was a new doctor or not. If we don’t dress nice enough then we are slobs and its depression and not our condition, even with a diagnosis. If we try and dress up “put the lipstick on” then we are able bodied, doing better, obviously not sick enough to need to be there. If we try to match the outside to how the inside feels than they say it is impossible to feel that bad, you’d be in the hospital if your pain was this extreme.

I have heard enough times “You have some makeup on, you must be feeling great”. Excuse me, I always wear some make up. Why should I look sickly in order to receive the care I need. Why do I need to look like I have not slept in days in order to be believed. Why should I have to show up like I have been crying for the last few days because I cannot get the pain to come down no matter what I do. Look at my trembling, look at the pain in my eyes, look at my HBP and my HHR, you can see the pain in the charts. But because I was able to mask my pain for a few moments to put some make up on I am no longer believed as much. I am labeled a drug seeker, because I do not look like I am in that much pain.

I am a person who at a pain level 4 or a 7 will push myself to get up and at the very least shower, even if that takes every ounce of energy. If I cannot, my husband will jump in the shower and help me wash up. If i do not shower the darkness takes over, I cannot be sucked into my sadness and be in this much pain. After some rest I put my signature amount of makeup, which is not a lot of make up, concealer to cover how exhausted I look, mascara and fill in my eyebrows to make the eyes pop, some bronzer to fake the sun that hasn’t kissed my skin and some chapstick. If I am at a 9, I have put the lipstick on. If my outside looks great and my outside can pretend like I am not about to give up, it keeps me from giving up to all of it. Those closest to me can see the pain in my eyes with the makeup or not. I just wish the doctors would look past all of it. Sadly the medical professionals correlate the two: What you look like vs how you feel is what in our experience, they use to diagnose us.

The only time I do not care about my appearance is when I am in the Emergency Room. When I can no longer manage the symptoms I am having, I finally go in. I have to make them believe in order to get the help I need. But not seem too eager or I am labeled a drug seeker. I need them to see my truth, I am in extreme pain, the only way to do that is to show them my face without makeup. I have to take off the mask I wear to hide pain from myself and the world.

What has your experience been, Do you put the lipstick on?

Questioning Religion: My Path to Understanding

I grew up in a very religious home; all of my family in the PNW belonged to the Hispanic Seventh-Day Adventist Church. We would keep the Sabbath, follow the diet, knock on doors to teach the world about God, study the Bible and all of the books the SDA Church provided, as if I was studying for the biggest test of my life. I remember in Bible class and youth service, they would quiz us on the chapters we were supposed to read that week and made sure we had those Bible verses memorized. At service, they would ask us how many diamonds would be in our crowns? Have you brought enough people to Jesus to earn that crown and get through those pearly gates when Jesus comes? Had I?

When I was really young, I would stay up wondering if I was good enough that day. Did I do enough for God today? Is He proud of me? I would pray and sing and beg for Him to hear me; I wanted to make sure God loved me. We would have service specials, and I would sign up with friends or family. We would practice and practice; I was about to give a concert to the church, but not just to the church, but to God and His angels, and because of this, He would be kind to me. Because of this, all the sadness I was going through would disappear. But the sadness didn’t leave.

I got to the age where I could be baptized, and my “dad” would not let me. He said I was too young. As soon as he left our family, I got baptized. I came to the realization that my sins needed to be forgiven. My dad must have left because I was a sinful child; I needed to wash my sins away. If I was good enough and was baptized, God would bring back my “dad” and we would be a happy family. I prayed and prayed and sang and sang; I did what I was supposed to do. My mom would cry; she missed him, my brother would cry and ask for him, but he was gone. I needed my mom to stop crying; I needed to end my tears. Me getting baptized did not bring him back, and the tears still flowed.

I learned the violin in school; I pushed myself to learn as much as I could. I wanted to play the violin for God, in His church. I wanted to praise God with His music. At church, the elders would call me “the violinist.” They would praise me and tell me to use my talents for God; He had given me these gifts, and I had no choice but to use them for Him. That’s what I did; anytime they would ask me to play a special with my violin, I would smile with nerves and say, “Yes.” I felt special; God was telling these leaders of my church to tell me to play. God knew I was doing everything I could to show Him I loved Him; surely God would fix my family and bring my “dad” back. He didn’t come back.

I was obviously not doing enough, and I could not do more. I began to rebel against the church. I stopped studying the books they gave us; I stopped knocking on doors; I stopped doing specials for the church and God. What was the point? He was not listening to me. But during my toughest days, I would always come back, crying, begging God to show me a sign that He was there. But He has never responded in a way I could say, “Yes, that’s Him, that’s God giving me a sign to come back to Him.” He never brought my dad back, no matter how hard I tried. He didn’t even help us mend our relationship, no matter how hard I tried; He never moved my “dad” enough to make him have a relationship with me.

My church family had always told me if I prayed hard enough, my prayers would be answered. If I was involved enough in the church, if I taught the world about God, if I sang for Him, performed for Him, He would answer my prayers. If my prayers were not answered, it was because I did not have enough faith. “Si tuvieras fe como un granito de mostaza,” i.e., “Faith the size of a mustard seed.” That was a lot of pressure for a child, a teen, me.

This is when I began to question religion and my church.