october (and a cautionary tale)

Usually while I eat breakfast I like to scroll through the daily news articles, because there’s always something interesting mixed into the boring stuff. A new fossil discovered? An octopus that’s been recorded punching fish? Red carpet photos from an award show that I didn’t know was going on? All good things to read, look at, watch, and (when it comes to fashion) judge while I eat my homemade sourdough bread, and start my day.

But lately almost every article has been political, with a certain orange-faced idiot and his moronic toadies plastered across all the news story.

As expected, it’s all been not only depressing and scary (exciting news: it’s almost time to try to enroll in healthcare that I’ll probably be denied! 🥂), it’s also been so blatantly and disgustingly hypocritical that it just about makes my blood boil.

As you can imagine: not a great way to start my day. So I decided to take a little break from the daily onslaught of terrible news, and take that time to get back to my Pinterest scrolling instead. After all, tis the season for new inspiration and creativity 🍂

No one can stop me from getting excited about making Christmas ornaments.

my Pinterest feed has been full of vintage-autumn photography vibes, and when I saw the yellow maple leaves falling, I knew I had to get out for a morning photoshoot

Currently my feed has been full of autumn aesthetics and vintagey/earthy color palettes, and it inspired me to get outside on a cold autumn morning and get some Pinterest-inspired photos. I went out with a very certain aesthetic in mind, and I think I ended up nailing it.

It goes without saying that this year’s autumn photoshoot was a little simpler than last year’s photoshoot, but I’m just as happy with the photos.

I haven’t done a good ol’ photoshoot since May when I posted the beautiful spring tulips!

hopefully you cannot tell in the photos, but it was 50 degrees out and windy, and I had to keep pausing to blow my nose and wipe my eyes

To be fair, my dinosaur-of-a-camera no longer auto-focuses, which means that I’ve had to embrace the non-precise focus points that I get by manually focusing every photo (you think I have the funds for a new camera?? Hilarious. I’ve been enjoying and embracing the artsy side of photography, as all poor people must do).

But probably the main reason that I haven’t felt inspired for any photoshoots is because yours truly has had the honor and privilege of developing a lovely case of cystic acne at the glorious age of 27.

I’ve been trying to add more “interesting” elements to my photography lately, and using some strategically-placed leaves over the lens made for the perfect vibes — it really brought my vision to life

If you’re lucky enough to be unfamiliar with cystic acne, the Google AI overview reads:

“Cystic acne is a severe form of acne characterized by deep, painful, and pus-filled cysts that form under the skin. It is a chronic condition that can cause significant scarring and emotional distress.“

Applaud me, please.

I’ll wait.

I think it goes without saying that acne sucks, and I don’t think anyone is that big of a fan of it. But I’m especially psycho about my skin. In fact, people’s skin is often the first thing I notice about them, because I’m so freakin aware of my own.

my lofty goal in life is to be a Pinterest girlie; if you ever wanna re-pin some of my photos, you can find them all on my {art by jordan rae} board

But the thing is, if anyone else has acne? I don’t mind at all. I think it’s even nice sometimes to see that humans are still humans. Now if I have a zit? Lawd, I’m convinced that I’m a disgusting ogre who’ll never be loved. I study my skin too closely, and I pick at my skin too often.

A real curse for a girl who inherited her dad’s oily, acne-prone skin. I went through some pretty rough patches in my teen and young adult years, so I was completely and utterly overjoyed when I finally reached a point last year where my skin was simply glowing.

Y’all — I’d never experienced such a thing. I woke up every day with a clear face.

A CLEAR FACE.

WITHOUT HAVING TO TRY.

please take one moment to truly appreciate my chosen editing style for this shoot

This was unheard of! Sure, I’d get a random period-pimple every now and then, but you can ask my family: I was constantly talking about, and fully appreciating, my smooth, healthy complexation.

I felt like a star.

Then I was stupid and entertained stupid boys. And somewhere between the shitty sleep schedule and the extreme stress of being gaslit into almost believing that talking about your feelings is immature — my skin started to break out.

I figured it’ll get better if I get back on a good sleep schedule, it always does!

I finally got my September wrap posted, you can watch it here!

It did not, people.

It. did. not.

Let this be a cautionary tale to one and all.

It was just a little bit at first, then it was undeniable and painful.

The thing about cystic acne is that it’s like acne…on steroids. These haven’t been normal pimples that would pop and heal — they’ve been deep in the skin, swollen, painful, unreachable, and spreading.

I like how this post feels like an ad on TV, talking about the horrible side effects of medication while a girl frolics in a field of daisies — good vibes

It hurt to wash my face in the shower and I started avoiding the mirror, and wearing my hair down to hide as much of my faces as I could.

Pair a major breakout with extremely humid summer days…rough does not begin to describe it. At the end of many days I wanted to cry. I was in much distressed.

It’s been extremely hard for me to accept, and I’ve been majorly self-conscious of it.

this is me crying about my first-world problems

Thankfully I have a mother who loves to fix things.

And with a good sleep schedule, a medicinal face-wash concoction, cutting off contact with certain people, and working to calm my hormones down — most days I feel like I’ve made a lot of progress with my skin.

I’m having less major/painful breakouts, which I’m beyond grateful for.

accidental out-of-focus photos are sometimes keepers just for the vibes alone

It’s funny how your perspective changes when new circumstances arise.

My “good” skin days at the moment are so much worse than my good skin days were at the beginning of the year, and if you had told me that I’d be covered with discolored acne scars/bumps by the end of the year I would’ve cried.

But at this point, I’m just happy that most days I have more healing scars than I do active acne.

I didn’t do sock curls much this summer because the humidity ruined them too quickly, but I see them coming back with the dry, cool weather

So there you have it, an October 1st photoshoot, and a cautionary tale.

And no, I will not blame the possibility of unbalanced hormones and ovarian cysts as the sole cause of this ailment, I will continue to blame myself for being a dumb girl who speaks to people who seem to enjoy belittling me (shame on me, I know).

On that note, I hope you’ve enjoyed this excessive amount of photos of me to celebrate me making good decisions for five minutes.

a small leaf that deserved some attention

Perhaps it will even inspire someone else to get outside and capture some hella aesthetic photos. I figure, we’re all gonna die someday, so we might as well take it upon ourselves to document our own gloriously-mundane lives.

What a journey, good people.

I shall not stop until I have my glowy skin back.

I’m a girl on a mission.