A new low

I know its bad when....

I walk into my old dry cleaner (one I haven't visited in 6 months), and while walking toward me smiling and saying hi, he face contorted and she said to me (with a look of grave concern):

"What happened to your face?"

Now, this may lead you to believe that I had gotten in a horrible facially-related accident that resulted in a grotesque scar, or a gash, or that I had gushing blood running down my cheek. You, my quick-to-jump-to-conclusions- friend, would be wrong.

If you have been reading for a while, you should know that nothing happened to my face.  I just still have the same old acne. 

Acne, which apparently warrants a huge over-reaction. 

Granted, I had just come from an extremely rigorous spin class where I sweated off any ounce of makeup I may have had left from this morning.

I didn't realize it was that bad.

Oh, out of the mouth of babes dry cleaners.....

So there I am caught like a deer in inappropriate-question headlights with no easy answer. How exactly do I explain to my dry cleaner who speaks very limited English, that its just zits?

I don't think my usual set of self deprecating adult acne jokes would go over very well.

The best I could come up with was, "it's just bad skin."

I think I've reached my new low.  

Being called out by my dry cleaner.

Ouch.

I think she felt bad; then I felt bad because she felt bad.

Maybe she will give me my dry cleaning for free?

When I told Chris about it, he started laughing because he didn't believe me.  He swears it's not that bad.  He also swears he doesn't see it.

He's a liar- unlike my dry cleaner, she calls it how she sees it (apparently).

It's all I see.

I am starting to doubt that homeopathy will work for me (here's the whole homeopathy story in case you missed it).

I'm tempted to go back on my prescription medications that probably are slowly eroding away at my insides, while making my outsides all bright, shiny and acne free.

Those meds would give me back hours of my free time that I spend Photoshopping every single picture I am in.

I've seriously toyed with posting photos of my skin so you can see what I'm working with, but that is just too scary.  Way too scary. 

I can't even look at photos of what my skin actually looks like without makeup on.

I can barely look in the mirror while I apply coats of mineral makeup each morning.

So here I am, 3 months after my first homeopathy appointment, trying to be a patient patient.

Unfortunately patience has never been my thing, and it is becoming harder and harder- especially when I know there is an easy fix.

I have promised my homeopath that I will hang in there for one more month.

She is certain that I just need more time.

She points to encouraging results:

- My 4-year-old knee pain (tendinitis) has all but vanished in the last 3 months I've been doing homeopathy

- My back and side pain is pretty much non-existent now

-My skin did have some clearer points and some aggravations in the first 6 weeks (which are signs that the remedy is working)

She also reminds me that skin is the VERY LAST thing in your body to heal and these things take time.

Maybe right now the remedy is working on my patience- trying to give me some.....

All I can hope is that someday, when we finally heal this acne, that she will write a case study about me.  At least then I'll be famous.

Until then, I will be going to a different dry cleaner.