Last year I attended my first ever Changing Faces - 'Get together' in London, and it was honestly the most life-changing experience I've ever had. #changingfaces #equality #acceptance #support
Changing Faces knows that people living with a condition, mark or scar affecting their appearance can benefit from meeting others who have a similar experience. It is with this understanding and responding to direct feedback from previous and current clients of Changing Faces that we are now providing a meeting every two months called Changing Faces Get Togethers. - Changing Faces (Get Together)
What is Changing Faces? 🐦
Changing Faces is the UK leading charity for people who are living with a facial difference. They offer support, counselling, makeup camouflage and advice for people of all ages. Changing Faces is supported by Katie Piper, Nikki Lily and Adam person who are people with different types of facial differences, who use their celebrity to fight for more equality for people who look different.
“We want a future where everyone with a visible difference on their face or body has the confidence, support and opportunity to lead the lives they want”. - Changing Faces
How I got to know about Changing Faces 🌺
In 2017 after I was dealing with the emotional trauma I felt after my first operation, my surgeon mentioned the charity Changing Faces. At the time I wasn't really interested in joining Changing Faces, I was still trying to process my face looking different and getting prepared for the general public treating me differently because of it. I also had no desire to meet others like me or even talk about what I was going through because I was still having a tough time accepting it myself, however, when I suddenly realized that I didn’t want to feel like an outcast or scared of public opinion anymore and I wanted to get back to the old Crystal a few years ago who had the confidence to do what she wanted and not care about what other people thought of her, I knew straight away that I had to meet other people like myself who I not only knew I would relate to, but could also give me some advice on how to better deal with living with a facial difference and help me gain that confidence I’d once lost.
I was now ready to become a part of a community where they understood where I was coming from and would listen without judgment or pity. I wanted to ensure myself that I wasn’t alone anymore.
'I think this is what we all want to hear: that we are not alone in hitting the bottom, and that it is possible to come out of that place courageous, beautiful, and strong'. - Anna White
My first day 😁🙏🏾
I'm not going to lie the first day was nerve-wracking 😩 I didn't know what to expect. I didn't know how many people were going to be there, I didn't know what the atmosphere was going to be like and overall, I was a bag of nerves. I was anxious, to say the least, but the thought that was playing the most on my mind was if I should walk in without having my hair cover up my face or not. I've never (to this day) step outside of the house without covering my cheek, so this was a really big decision for me to think about. I began to argue with myself that if I were to walk into a room full of people with a facial difference, then surely I wouldn't be judged for the face under my hair or what my cheek looked like, but eventually I decided (at the start at least) that I was going keep my face covered until I felt more comfortable enough to show my cheek.
I think the main reason why I've become so comfortable hiding my face is that, in a way, it is sort of my barrier and my shield. Regardless of the situation, I always felt the need to hide and protect myself from any negativity or onlookers, but if I look back now, I think I sort of knew deep down that I wouldn't get that sort of negativity during a meeting full of people with different facial differences, but I was still a bit apprehensive.
Get Together 👫💝 #changingfaces #gettogether
I walked into the meeting felling anxious as hell with my mom (it was kind of awkward because I was the last one to arrive 😅) and the first thing I saw was this woman with a birthmark on her cheek, which kind of made me relieved because it resembled my own facial difference and another woman who had a birthmark all over her face.
I have to admit, I was a bit taken aback seeing these two women because I've never spoken or approached a person with a facial difference before, and this left me feeling kind of awkward and unprepared because I didn't know how to react. I already knew from my own personal experience that I didn’t enjoy certain stares or looks I get from people because it made me feel uncomfortable, so unconsciously, at the start of the meeting I rarely looked or glanced their way because I didn't want to offend them by accidentally staring at something I was curious by.
I believe that by me acknowledging this straight away was very beneficial for me because it made me realise why certain people react to me the way they do. I get so annoyed when people stare at me, but I also get upset when I get avoided in a group conversation. I now realise that maybe some people rarely look me in the eye is because they don't want to offend and (unconsciously as I did with those two women) they might not realise how much it can be hurtful to the other person to be ignored completely.
The difference between getting stared at and wanting acceptance are completely different things. Depending on the context, if a person with a facial difference wants to talk and be friendly with you, gaining eye contact is okay because it's in the right scenario, however if you just stare for the sake of it (which curiosity isn't a bad thing) sometimes it can offend certain people.
I strongly believe that now I have a more better understanding of this, I will now be able to act differently in the future.
How the session impacted me 😇 #Support #kindness #acceptance
The session went better than expected! It was the first time I truly felt like I belonged and I'd finally met people who knew exactly what I was going through.
In the short amount of time I've been living with a facial difference I've begun to realise that no matter how many cancer events I've attended I'd always felt like I didn't belong, and in some cases I didn't feel like I was 100% accepted because I looked different, however, I believe that after speaking with these women about the stares we get, the operations we've had and how we deal with society and our perception of beauty and even meeting a new friend who, after the session, gave me some advice on dealing with society, dating and just any other challenges I've had in life, I believe it really helped me grow as a person because it made me realise I wasn't alone anymore and for that I'm extremely grateful I went.
Wrap it up 😁❤️
Dealing with something as traumatic as facial cancer has been hard, but by having the support from Changing Faces Get Together sessions it helped me have a new positive outlook on life, because I'd suddenly realised that not only was I not the only one who was different, but I had now met people who were exactly like me and could understand what I was going through.
If you would like to donate as little as £5 to the charity, so that they can continue helping people like me gain more confidence with these gets together sessions, it would be greatly appreciated 😁.
https://www.changingfaces.org.uk/donate
Thank you x
- Crystal
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