by A father who wore make-up and fake tan to cover up his vitiligo for 16 years has revealed how he finally learned to accept his condition.
Elj Abid, 35, from Witham, Essex, first noticed a patch of discolored skin on his face when he was seven.
As he got older the patches spread over his neck, hands, arms and legs and he was diagnosed with vitiligo – an autoimmune condition where white patches develop on the skin.
To cover up his vitiligo Elj started wearing make-up every day from the age of 11 and also used fake tan to hide his skin on holidays.
The now-dad-of-two feared that if he didn’t wear make-up he wouldn’t be “attractive” or “attractive”.
But after meeting his now wife, Elj decided to ditch the “sweaty” make-up on his wedding day, aged 27, and has never looked back.
“I’ve used make-up since middle school,” explains Elj, who works in advertising. “It gave me a sense of security.
“I felt like when I wasn’t wearing make-up I didn’t look attractive.
“As a child you want to be loved and desired.
“It took me a long time to love myself, but now I accept it.”
First Elj saw a small circular white patch appear on one side of his forehead, and the same one appeared on the other side a few months later, which he later learned is because vitiligo is symmetrical.
The patches were not particularly noticeable until Elj reached year seven when they began to appear on other parts of his body.
Although he was not bullied for his skin, he did occasionally face traffic and was referred to as “panda eyes” by some.
He tried various medications and treatments to try to “cure” his condition – such as drinking tree roots, light therapy and creams.
“I remember drinking a cup of mud,” he says.
As an adult, Elj tried a cream that dehydrates the skin cells to restore the original pigment, which helped soften the patches.
But despite that, he says he wasn’t confident enough to stop wearing make-up.
It was Elj’s wife, Amy, 35, a data analyst, who played a big part in his own adoption – after they met aged 15.
“She made me see another side of myself,” Elj says of the twist.
“I started on a make-up free weekend.
“A big change came as I got older. I got lazy. I didn’t mind putting on my make-up but I still used to put it on before work.”
When the couple tied the knot in Jamaica, in June 2016, Elj realized he didn’t want to look back at the photos of the day and see how uncomfortable he was in his make-up.
“It always makes you sweat,” he explains.
A comment made by a friend of his wife helped him change his attitude.
“She said ‘does Elj realize that people are staring at him more because he is a man wearing make-up than his skin?’,” he explains about the turnaround.
“I woke up the next day and went to apply make-up but instead I threw it all in the bin.”
Elj’s final motivation to accept his vitiligo was when he was a dad of two boys – a one-year-old and a three-year-old.
“Because of the time kids take up it’s not even my mind,” he says of his condition.
“I want to make it clear to them as well [my sons] that vitiligo is not a bad thing.”
The condition has a hereditary nature so there is a chance that Elj’s boys will also experience it.
“I want to make sure they are equipped to deal with it,” he says.
“It’s not going to kill you.”
What is vitiligo?
The NHS says vitiligo is a long-term condition where white patches develop on the skin.
It is due to the lack of melanin, which is the pigment in the skin.
Undifferentiated vitiligo (the most common type) is thought to be an autoimmune condition.
In autoimmune conditions, the immune system does not work properly. Instead of attacking foreign cells, such as viruses, your immune system attacks your body’s healthy cells and tissues.
If you have non-segregative vitiligo, your immune system destroys the melanocyte skin cells that make melanin.
The condition can affect any area of the skin, it commonly appears on the face, neck and hands, and in skin folds.
Vitiligo often starts as a pale patch of skin that gradually turns completely white.
Although it does not cause discomfort to your skin, such as dryness, the patches may be itchy at times.
The condition varies from person to person and while some will only experience a few small white patches, others can experience large white patches that connect across large areas of their skin.
Although the white patches caused by vitiligo are usually permanent, there are a number of treatment options, which can reduce their appearance.
– If the patches are relatively small, skin camouflage cream can be used to cover them.
– Steroid creams can also be used on the skin to restore some pigmentation, but long-term use can cause stretch marks and thinning of the skin
– If steroid creams do not work, phototherapy (treatment with light) may be used.
Although treatment may help restore color to your skin, the effect is usually short-lived and treatment cannot stop the condition from spreading.
Additional reporting SWNS.
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