In a cramped room of half of the fifth-grade girls, a state-funded puberty video plays that is less than intriguing. I aimlessly pick at my skin while I try to stay awake in the back of the room. There’s a new pimple on my cheek, to add to the 10 already plaguing my skin.
“Pimples are created from a build-up of oil in your skin glands, this oil commonly comes from your hands.” The polite voice of the middle-aged woman rings through the classroom as an animated pore fills up with oil.
I don’t see it. What I see instead are fifty pairs of eyes turning to look at me. Half of the girls in my grade stare at my hand picking at my new pimple. My face heats up, a blush filling in the small gaps between my bright red peaks. The gaps are few and far between so it doesn’t take long before my entire face is beet red.
That was the first time I realized my acne was noticeable.
A few months go by. I recognize I have acne, but I don’t think too much about it. It is just part of my face. No big deal. Until one fateful day on the playground that I will think about every day for the next decade.
My friend and I are debating between the jungle gym or the climbing rock. I don’t notice the boys have stopped their usual soccer game. When we opt for the rock, that’s when I see the class-wide soccer game has stopped. Suddenly a swarm is coming my way.
At the front of the group is one of the most popular boys in our grade, a friend of mine. Well, a friend of a friend. Well, the friend is currently mad at me. He comes straight up to me. He’s fuming. I feel all eyes on me. The swarm of my classmates closes in on me.
“Nicole, you can’t say anything about anyone because you have acne and it makes you UGLY!”
I don’t know how to breathe anymore. I can’t feel any of my limbs. All I can feel are the pimples on my face and the hundred eyes staring at them.
Before I knew I had acne… but now I was aware of my acne. And it didn’t go away. No matter how much I washed my face, no matter how much I stopped touching my face, every ointment, pill, cream, etc. from a doctor came up short. Antibiotics, steroids, birth control, you name it I’ve tried. And every day for a decade I had to look in the mirror at my acne-covered skin and hear the words-
“You have acne and it makes you ugly.”
For a while, it was still that boy’s voice in my head. A boy who went on to be beloved by all, who ended up being my high school chemistry partner, who went on to speak at our graduation. A boy whom I actually try to have no ill feelings towards. But I will never ever forgive him for what he said. How after a few weeks it was not his voice I heard anymore when I looked in the mirror. It was my own. Telling myself every day for over a decade that this medical condition of mine made me ugly.
And I know so many people feel this way. And as much as I can preach that acne doesn’t make you ugly–because it doesn’t. Those words aren’t helpful to someone dealing with acne. I know that I have never once looked at a person with acne and thought they were ugly, but I know that I have never looked at my acne and not thought I was ugly. So instead of trying to preach that you should embrace the imperfections, a tactic I know will not be helpful. I want to share the one thing that did help me: Accutane.
I was so hesitant to start Accutane. I had only ever heard horror stories about breakouts, depression, hair falling out, weight gain, and so on that I didn’t even want to look in Accutane’s direction.
However, now that I have done it, I regret not taking the magic pill sooner.
The first time I started Accutane I was a freshman in college. It worked a little bit but once I was off, all my acne came back within a month. My dermatologist recommended a second round and I declined, not wanting to put myself through that again.
In the summer before my senior year of college, I looked in the mirror and decided I couldn’t feel disappointed every time I saw my face and I didn’t want to take steroids or use a cream for the rest of my life. I need a lasting solution. I need to go back on Accutane.
I searched for a new dermatologist and with one look at my skin she knew accutane would be the only cure. I told her how it didn’t work for me before. It was then that she ran through a list of vital information about how Accutane is made effective, none of which was shared with me the first time around.
The most important piece of information. Accutane is a lipid-based drug (or at least that’s how she explained it to me). If you do not take it while eating fatty food, the pill is basically inactive. Freshman year me who took the pill on an empty stomach was screaming when I heard this. The most important piece of information, the only way to activate the drug, and I was not informed of it? No wonder it didn’t work.
So over the summer, I started a new round, with a higher dosage and better education on the medicine, and I am here in November on month five to say it is the best decision I have ever made. I no longer dread having to go to the bathroom in fear I might catch a glimpse of my face. I don’t have to cry when asked to take a picture because of how my acne looks on camera. I don’t even have to wear foundation anymore to feel comfortable to leave the house.
There are so many horror stories that come with accutane, but my experience has been nowhere near as scary as people made it seem. Do I get headaches every day? Yes, but they’re mild and more annoying than painful. Are my lips dry? Yes, but Vaseline has saved my life and made it barely noticeable as long as I regularly apply it. The side effects I was not expecting were muscle soreness and joint pain, I will admit that one does get me a little bit.
However, the positives outweigh any sort of nuisance side effects. I get to look in the mirror and be happy with what I see. I have rediscovered my beautiful face that had been hiding underneath that acne and self-esteem issues for all those years. I can’t even remember the last time my face and skin looked this good. And I especially can’t remember the last time I felt this good when I looked in the mirror.
While my acne didn’t actually make me ugly, it made me feel that way. And if I could go back in time and do accutane right as early as high school I would. I have never looked and felt better.