Having pale skin can be a real pain in the butt. I have to protect my skin from the sun every single time I go out no matter what the weather. Tanning? Forget it. I tend to avoid the sun as much as possible to be honest. The other struggle is finding make up products that don't make you look like you've just dipped your face in mud.
If you knew me in secondary school then you can vouch for how bad my make up was. I was constantly sporting that horrible orange line on my neck. The trouble wasn't that I didn't know how to apply make up, because I did, there was just never any products available for skin as pale as me. Granted there is a lot more now, which is brilliant, but when I was growing up there was no Fenty Beauty or Kat Von D foundations.
Looking after my skin is a full time job. If you haven't read my Skin Care Routine post yet then I recommend reading that just to get an understanding of what I go through every day looking after my skin. As someone with acne prone skin I always wanted a high coverage foundation or concealer to hide my pimples and also my freckles (I love freckles now but I don't have any anymore!), but alas, none were available.
Working with make up has given me a great opportunity to explore different brands and products to find out which ones work best for me and my (nearly) translucent skin. The best drug store brand I've found that caters to pale skin is GOSH cosmetics. They have lots of different base products in shades perfect for pale to medium skin. From their powers to their liquid foundations I've found something that works for me. I currently just use the GOSH cosmetics CCC stick in light 003 and the GOSH mineral full coverage foundation powder in Ivory 002. These two products alone provide me with great coverage and they're the perfect match for my white skin.
Quite a few brands now do lightening and darkening drops to mix in with foundations to alter the shade. My favourite are the MUA cool lightening drops. They work really well with my cool skin tone without making my product too yellow.
Although there are a lot more products for pale skin now than there was about 5 years ago it can still be hard to find shades that suit you right. This works for dark skin too. It's just as hard, if not harder to find shades to dark-very dark skin. But I think that now the make up industry is taking steps in the right direction, so I think we can expect to find more variety and choice when it comes to cosmetics. And honestly, black-owned make up brands are taking the industry by storm and creating all these beautiful, diverse products; so that is something really exciting to look forward to!
Thank you for reading
Bx
Photos from superdrug.com
I am a serial hair dyer. I've always had a funny relationship with my hair. I'm a natural ginger although I've had pretty much every hair colour. I was bullied a lot when I was younger for having ginger hair, I even got attacked on the way home from school when I was 11. I know, so pathetic. Anyway, after that incident I really really wanted to dye my hair, my Mum finally caved and since then my hair has been to Hell and back.
I went so long just dying my hair red, purple, brown and black, and it wasn't until about 18 months ago I actually decided to go blonde. I did it myself which was my first mistake. Putting shop-bought bleach on dark brown dyed hair is never going to work. My hair turned this bright orange with dark patches everywhere. Then I made my second mistake, bleaching it again! Putting bleach on already bleached hair is probably the worst thing you can do to your hair. My hair went so dry. I decided not to cut the dead ends off my hair; mistake number three!
You'd think I would've learned my lesson. Nope! My hair was so abused for so long, it was in such bad condition. I ended up having to cut my mid-length hair up in to a chin-length bob. I wasn't too fussed about that. But... I still didn't learn! I decided to bleach my hair again. So stupid. My hair basically turned to mush so I had to have even more cut off, but even after so much hair being removed my hair was so dry.
So this is how I got my hair from horrible, dry straw to soft and healthy:
I used a lot of products for this. But I think the main reason my hair is so much better now is because I only wash it once a week, if it's lucky, I can go longer. This allows my hair to soak in its natural oils to add a bit more moisture to it. This also helps if you have greasy hair, or it gets greasy really easy because your scalp releases oils and if they're not removed your skin will eventually stop producing so much.
I also used a lot of coconut oil with Aloe Vera (not sure if it did anything really) as a hair mask. Sometimes I'd leave it on overnight otherwise I'd leave it on for an hour or two. It made my hair smell so so good, and it was super soft although I didn't really notice a difference in the texture of my hair; there may have been a small improvement.
Then, about 6 months ago I was browsing the Superdrug website and decided to have a look at the Black hair care section because I know that the texture of African/Black hair is different to my hair; it's dryer and doesn't take in moisture as well so it needs heavy duty hair moisturisers. There I found out that Almond oil is amazing on dry hair, and I also found coconut and manuka honey protein masks by Palmer's.
These products work heavenly. After one use of the almond oil and half a pack of the coconut protein mask mixed with Shea Moisture's black castor oil hair mask my hair was so soft and smooth. My hair just soaked up all the products because it was so dry but the end result was amazing. I now use this mask a couple times a month just to keep my hair moisturised.
I highly recommend these products as they have seriously done some magic to my hair. I'm so glad I found them. They can all be found on the Superdrug website and are reasonably priced. The black castor oil mask is more on the pricey side but you get such a huge tub (I've barely used any) and it works like a dream so I really believe that it's worth the money. In fact they're all on offer on the website currently (1/1/18)
Thank you for reading!
Bx
Trigger warning: I do talk about self harm and suicide attempts in this post so read with caution.
Dealing with mental health impacts every aspect of life, even if you're not the one that's ill. The chances of you knowing someone with mental health problems is very high, you may not even be aware of their conditions. Depression and anxiety affect every 1 in 6 people in the UK. Although, 1 in 4 people suffer from mental health problems.
Mental health is as serious as any physical injury and should treated as such. I personally suffer from depression and anxiety. It can hit anyone: man, woman, gay, straight, black or white; it doesn't matter who you are or even your social status.
My experience with depression and anxiety has been a roller coaster. I first noticed it when I was about 16 years old, although I believe it was there earlier as I was bullied for many reasons, the main one being my ginger hair. The trigger was my Mums husband leaving, then having to care for my Mum. He left right before my GCSE's, and it caused me to miss a lot of school which ended up piling on the stress for me. As a 16 year old this truly affected me terribly. I started self harming and basically begging for attention from anyone because I felt so low I just wanted someone to be there. On top of all of this I was internally dealing with my sexuality, I didn't know who I was. I'm bisexual, and now I embrace it but at the time I absolutely didn't want to be judged. Even though I've faced bi-phobia I'm comfortable enough with myself to not let it effect me too much.
Although I did okay in my exams it caused me to have anxiety about school and education in general really. People judging and talking behind your back about how you skived so much school hurt me and scarred me. This went on until college. I rarely went due to anxiety, and my mood was so low I saw no point or no future for myself which then put me off going even more. It was a vicious cycle. I only lasted about 3 months at college. The college was completely unsympathetic to my situation and even told my whole tutor about my issues. Which, you guessed it, triggered even more anxiety.
In February of 2015 I took an overdose of pills and was admitted to hospital where I was placed on a drip and monitored for 24 hours. This was a horrible experience for me and my family. Even though my Mum and Dad were with me whenever they could be, none of my friends came to see me or seem to care about it. This hurt and made me feel even worse. After this incident I dropped out of college and was sent to counselling.
This wasn't my first time at counselling. In fact it was my third. The first two being completely unsuccessful. Honestly, going in to my first session I didn't have high standards. I wasn't expecting it to go well. It didn't. I ended up going to one session. I hated it so much.
After that I did nothing about my mental health for just over a year. In that year I had ups and downs. I had a job but my anxiety got the better of me and I ended up leaving my job and doing nothing for a few months. Until I found another job.
Towards the end of 2016 I got really low. I ended up missing work, and I didn't want to do that; I loved my job and the people there and felt like I was letting them down which caused more anxiety, unsurprisingly. Because of this I decided to do something about it, I wanted help, I didn't want to feel the way I felt anymore. I made a doctors appointment and ended up being referred to CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy). The best thing to ever happen to me really. It was so different to the other counselling I'd had before. The woman I had working with me was (and still is) amazing and helped me so much.
Around this time I was placed on anti-depressants and still take them today. I believe they've worked although I still have quite bad symptoms of depression and anxiety. After my counselling sessions finished (I had 6 sessions over the course of 8 weeks) I continued at my job but grew increasingly anxious and sad which then caused me to leave my job unfortunately. My manager was such an angel and really understood my situation. I am truly grateful as I'm aware not everyone is so empathetic to people with mental health problems. So, currently jobless and attending CBT again I'm starting to see a future for myself and I'm starting to pick myself up and stop feeling sorry for myself.
My mental health has caused me to be bad at holding relationships with people as I get so anxious and stressed and I hold it in and push people away from me. My mood can change in the blink of an eye which I can't control no matter how hard I try. It puts a real strain on me. I've lost so many good friends over the years because of my mental health. It happens, and no one should have to apologise for their symptoms, and I've learned not to do that. So don't ever think you deserve less because of your mental health.
I wanted to share this because I wanted to tell people my story and show that a lot of people go through shit and if you're feeling low that you're not alone. I am always open to talk on instagram @brennaahenryy and twitter @brewdarrymore if anyone wants to talk to a stranger (sometimes its easier).
I also want to say that if you're worried or anxious there are people you can talk to. Here are some numbers you can call if you're struggling:
You're never alone and there will always be someone to help.
I want to tell you about this app I saw advertised on Twitter called Calm Harm. It's an app you can download for FREE on IOS and android. There is lots of different ways to control harming urges on the app from distractions to breathing exercises which also help with panic attacks and anxiety related problems. I've used it myself and I highly rate it!!
I want to thank you for letting me share my mental health journey, even though it's not complete yet. I'm anxious about posting this, but even if one person sees it and talks to someone that's a positive to me.
Bx
