From a very young age, Eduarda Lemes, 23, has suffered from acne on her face and body. On her social media, the young woman shows her struggle to deal with the marks and admits that not every day is easy, however, she has seen good results with the treatments.
The digital influencer began experiencing acne problems at the age of nine, and even with the passage of time and the use of specific products, the marks did not go away; at times, they even reappeared with greater intensity.
Some comedones (known as blackheads) started appearing when I was nine years old, on my forehead. The other children had perfectly clear faces, and I had skin covered in pimples. Between 11 and 12, I developed acne conglobata, which I still have today. And these are the acne that leave scars on the skin – and they are huge,” she told the digital magazine Marie Claire.
See more: What causes pimples and how to treat them?
Eduarda then began to compare herself to other girls, which directly affected her self-esteem. The young woman, for example, avoided appearing in photos with others.
“(…) I didn’t like taking pictures with my friends and I thought I was the ugly duckling of the group, that’s the truth. “I know it’s ugly to use that word, but I felt like a little monster,” she confides.
In adolescence, the acne began to cause greater concern due to increased inflammation. Eduarda and her parents then sought medical help, especially from a gynecologist, to find out if the sores were a hormonal issue, which was ruled out.
“(…) In addition to the physical pain, there was the emotional pain. Many people don’t know that a person with severe acne goes through several embarrassing situations. I lived with pain every day. It hurt when washing my face, sleeping, even the water falling from the shower was uncomfortable, and hugging someone was difficult.” “If I walked around the house and bumped into something, it was terrible,” she lists.
See more: Can acne kill? Experts explain why this happens and the best treatments.
To hide the injuries a little, Eduarda kept her hair very long and threw the strands over her face, even on hot days.
“Regarding clothes, I didn’t wear low-cut tops and I didn’t wear just any color of fabric either. One thing that happened a lot was that the acne would leak while I was out of the house, and that would stain and dirty my clothes. If the acne was inflamed, I wouldn’t set foot outside. I was practically locked up at home,” she says.
Furthermore, the young woman was a target of bullying, which made her reluctant to be in public.
“Anyone who is outside the norm goes through this. I suffered a lot from comments, both from older people, who came up to me saying that I needed to try this or that recipe to improve my acne. Once, they said I needed to pray, drink pure grape juice with yam, and I did, I tried everything,” she says.
The worst came from people of similar age: “Teenagers were terrible. I heard someone say that whoever dated me was a brave person, because nobody would date a dirty person. Besides that, there were the nicknames: chocolate bar, dragon, others were quite harsh.”
After years of struggling to find a solution to her problem, Eduarda decided to make her journey public and has been filming her routine ever since. With tips on products and homemade recipes for skin and hair, the young woman gained prominence on TikTok and currently helps many people who face similar problems.
