The COVID-19 pandemic has changed my life forever. After the pandemic, I was diagnosed with severe anxiety and depression. And the last 3 years have been the worst of my entire life. My senior year of high school was terrible, my freshman year of college was ten times worse and it always feels like nothing ever goes right for me. I’ve done so many things just to feel normal and fit in. I have literally gone to so many different dermatologists and have spent almost $400+ for my skin to get clear and at one point it did. But of course, my ance had to come back and now makes me feel more insecure every time I look in the mirror or even when others look at me. I’ve tried to dress in a certain way, drink, smoke, etc. just because I felt like all of my friends were doing it so if I didn’t I was “boring” or just ruined the mood.
But after being in therapy for a few years now, I’ve recently slowly come to except myself. I think ever since I was young, I tried to fit in no matter what and my anxiety and depression made this even worse. Also when looking at social media, I have always compared myself to people I saw and questioned why I didn’t look or do certain things like them. But I’ve come to learn that there is no such thing as a “perfect” or “normal” person. As humans, we express ourselves in many different ways with the way we dress, talk, and go on with our daily lives. Our differences don’t make us unnatural but are what makes us all special in our own way. While I have improved over the year myself, I still have a long way to go and I hope one day, I won’t give a fuck about what other people think about me and be cunty. :)))
Unruly Bodies 
I am in the same boat as you, as I have been struggling with acne and desperately wanting to find the right products for my skin. I had really bad acne when the pandemic started. It gradually became worse and it negatively impacted my self-esteem. Everyone in my family has clear skin except for me. At first I was insecure about my acne, but I learned to not care what other people think as time went on. I’m glad that you learned to accept yourself and not care what others think. I wish you the best of luck on your journey!
Wow, thanks for calling me out like that. JK 🙂 I feel you on a spiritual level friend. As a woman, I like “feminine” things, and like other women, I like “masculine” things too. While my family is great, they are not very progressive. They think because I like such things I am trying to appear manly. My mother pushes me to wear makeup and dress more feminine, and I do, but just when I feel like it. Here’s to breaking norms and ignoring societal pressures!
im so proud of you! going to therapy and going through the motions of accepting yourself is always a journey that a lot of people have trouble going through but the fact that you put yourself in that position just shows how strong you are, covid really did affect us all in different ways mentally but i hope you are doing better!
I am so happy for you for just surviving Covid-19’s worst moments. I feel the exact same way about the pandemic and how it altered me; I lost my graduation, prom, first varsity year on tennis, and it felt like I was still in high school after I had begun going to the university level. You’re absolutely right that no one is perfect, and our memories and experiences, including the pandemic, only shape ourselves and our ability to adapt and conquer.
I feel as though being isolated from everyone during COVID really increased social anxiety and depression for a lot of us. We had little to no social interaction for almost two years, which definitely made the adjustment to college more difficult. I didn’t fully gain confidence in myself and get out of my shell until nearly the end of my freshman year at UMBC. I also relate to comparing myself to others, especially on social media. It’s so easy to get caught up in how other people are living their lives and compare my life to what they post. I’m so glad you’re taking steps to improve your self-confidence and I hope you are able to live your best life. Thank you for sharing 🙂
First, thank you for sharing.
I think this post is what a lot of people are struggling with til this day. The pandemic really hit us and with social media being the main point of contact between everyone during quarantine, the struggles with comparison and media heightened with the pandemic.
In regards to this post, I have seen this theory circulating online about people having a halt in their growing process during the pandemic and after we all went back to normal we were still stuck in the same age as we were when we first entered the pandemic. It is kind of unrelated to this post, but I thought it was interesting to share!
I’ve been struggling with acne too (since middle school) Specifically cystic acne. On top of that I was always insecure of how tan I was then. I’m a lot paler now (since it’s winter) but my acne is still pretty bad. I usually try putting makeup on to cover it up but at some point my make up make things worse, it wouldn’t look as good as it was before, so I stopped. Now I don’t have a way of covering my insecurities with out making it worse. I hope one day society completely normalizes acne for the little girls today so they can be happy looking in the mirror when they’re older. Hopefully one day we all serve cunt 🙂