‘It was my gateway drug to self-harm’: a writer’s journey to finding the joy in makeup

As a girl, the author Emma Forrest defaced herself with lipstick to convey the emotional maelstrom she felt inside. Now in her 40s, she has finally mastered how to use makeup as an agent of happiness

The connection I feel between makeup and mental health started before I was old enough to wear it out of the house – either the cosmetics or the mood swings. It first began with someone else’s irrational behaviour: antisemitism at primary school. This was exactly the age I was starting to contemplate my appearance. The club classic: “Aren’t you sorry you killed Christ?” was a regular. Because of my curly hair and olive skin they called me the N-word – a small child has to really yearn to use the N-word to say it to a predominantly Ashkenazi Jew. They also incorporated into their bullying the three moles I have on my right cheek. “See, that’s proof, these are the mark of the devil,” they said. So you’d think I was interested in things to flatten and cover those moles, but I actually retaliated by using my mum’s eye pencil to draw them on even more prominently.

After a bad day at secondary school – where I had friends, but an impossible time concentrating – I’d lock myself in the bathroom to make up my face with immaculate focus. If I got it slightly wrong, I’d need to make it much worse – swooping lipstick circles and bad words in eyeliner – until I’d made myself look how I felt inside. Once I’d studied the monster in the mirror, I meticulously washed it off. It was, I realised later, a gateway drug to bulimia and self-harm.

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