I break out all over

Shortly after halfway through the year of selfies, I had started to make pretty good peace with my image. I still didn't think I was attractive, but I was at least starting to see that it didn't matter much. Around this time, lots of little things happened to underscore the lack of attractiveness.

The hair coloring mishap didn't help, but I knew that was only temporary. However, it was about that time that I started noticing all of these red streaks across my neck and shoulders. I appeared to have broken out in hives.

That could have been a logical response to stress; I had a great deal at the time. I cannot say that my scalp becoming dryer and itching more was also related to stress, but I was pretty sure that my inability to stop compulsively scratching was.

Some of that could have just been dryer weather, because we were all itching more in general. I noticed that more for my back because my rotator cuffs had really tightened up and scratching any old place myself was not an option.

In addition, after years of having a pretty good complexion without ever having to worry about it that much, suddenly I had these groupings of small red pimples around my mouth and nose.

I did not feel pretty, and I could not blame that on being fat. Previously weight loss was going to be the magic bullet that fixed everything. That theory had been shot full of holes a while ago, and I had come to see how reductive it was. Now I was trying to see things differently, at least partly because of the stress. I had every reason to believe that the sources of stress were going to be around for a while, and chronic stress has side effects way beyond blotchy skin.

My general go-to strategy is to start with internet searches. I learned a few things. That acne is called Perioral Dermatitis. Actually, I guess I just learned one thing.

I read about causes and treatments for hives and perioral dermatitis and dandruff and psoriasis and eczema (because I wasn't sure what my flakes were) and there was a remarkable lack of definition.

It's not that I couldn't go to a dermatologist and get an official diagnosis for my scalp, but it doesn't seem like it would make a lot of difference. For one thing, my symptoms aren't really that bad, comparatively. That is a good reason to not undergo any extreme treatments, but also, a lot of what you can do are things that may help, but probably won't get rid of it all the way. Even very good dermatologists often can't do much about the scalp.

It's even worse for the perioral dermatitis. First of all, one thing I read is that it affects women between the ages of 15 and 45, though it can affect any age group. Even without the "any age group" clause, what a useless age range! Though I guess that means it should clear up before my next birthday. Causes can include steroid use (which doesn't apply but could preclude some other skin remedies), reactions to makeup (that's not it), and excessive drooling. Okay, I hope I would know if I had that, but how does that work? Are pores getting clogged by... never mind, I try to keep the blog from getting too gross without a purpose.

Treatments tend to focus on stopping the cause, but if you can't find a cause, that's not an option. I suspect this is pretty common because among the other suggestions are essential oils, which makes you wonder if they neglected to mention wishing really hard.

It's not that there was nothing I could do - and I will go over that tomorrow - but these are common things where there may not be a lot that anyone can do, and in looking worse, I felt better.

You don't know how embarrassed I have been about my scalp, all of my life. I was so ashamed to have those scales and the compulsive scratching really increased that, but they mean nothing. They may have a genetic component, they probably are related to the thickness of my hair, and I think they would get really bad with dreadlocks. Maybe I could get rid of them by shaving my head, but if the goal is attractiveness I do not believe the shape of my head lends itself well to this remedy. This is just how I look, and it doesn't matter.

I am not an actress or model or newscaster. There are people for whom personal appearance does matter. If they have to go to extremes and eliminate the Whole-30 foods for the rest of their lives plus a multi-stage daily facial cleanse, that could be worth it to them. Or it might not matter because they might have good makeup artists and some airbrushing to help.

For me, it just wasn't going to pay off to fret about it.