I’m Maria, but the nickname I go by is Yuki (long story short, I was pale & anime was in, and Yuki – jp. snow). I’m 24 and I live in Bucharest, Romania. I’ve worked in many places over the years and I’m currently a social media digital marketer (and I love it). In my spare time, I love to write, I am an avid reader, I listen to music like it’s my main drug of choice, I love to run and research on nutrition and skincare so one day I can start a business that will focus on the link between the two and help as many people as I possibly can.
I started having acne when I hit puberty, nothing much really in the beginning, but I was a picker (dermatillomania), and receiving the wrong advice and care my acne got progressively worse. I have had depression since I was about 7 (diagnosed professionally, both parents have it) so I cannot place a causality relationship between my acne and depression, but in my low points, I do see that my acne can aggravate if I let myself go.
Due to my natural predisposition to depression I have unfortunately gathered over the years a multitude of body issues and self-esteem issues due to my acne and body – my whole world revolved around my acne and my skin. I have tried pretty much everything in order to get rid of my acne except Accutane – diets, products, sports, treatments, you name it. Once, I hoped to become an opera singer, but due to my socio-economic situation at the time I could not pursue this, and neither my acne helped – when I watched all the girls around me looking like fairytale princesses I renounced completely any dreams surrounding this topic and decided I will become better at something else. I still wonder at times how my life would have been if I wasn’t afraid in those moments.
I have not truly lived my teen years due to acne – I’ve avoided social gathering, I was embarrassed to have a boyfriend or girlfriend, I’ve questioned why they liked me at all seeing myself only as my acne and defects, I have starved myself into thinking that “clean” eating might get rid of my acne, I have spent almost half of the money I have ever made on acne products and to no prevail.
It is not easy, it is not vanity, it’s just me trying to keep on living as a normal person even if my own skin might not be considered “normal”.
Recently I’ve been diagnosed with Hashimoto’s, an auto-immune disease that linked a chunk of my symptoms together – depression, irregular cycles, pain, sensitivity to food, products, memory loss, acne, etc. The acne community has been a blessing to me in these past months in which my acne has worsened & got at its worst. I am still battling my own inner demons & depression, but with this community, to put it simply, I do not feel so alone, and this is one of the best feelings in the world to me, something that still seems unreal to me as I’ve felt deserted almost all of my life even if I was surrounded by people. I definitely feel more at peace with myself since I joined this beautiful community of people and I am sure everything will keep on getting better in the future. One of my main goals in this community is to bring awareness to many conditions & facts that people misunderstand such as depression, stress, nutrition, misophonia, and dermatillomania.
What I’d wish people to know about acne is this – it is not easy to ignore the looks that people give you and your own thoughts that break your mind when your self-image is so fragile that you can’t even take a single look in the mirror. It is not easy, it is not vanity, it’s just me trying to keep on living as a normal person even if my own skin might not be considered “normal”.
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