A message from an ‘ugly’ woman

[Over40Overdating]

I am, by all conventional standards, an ‘ugly’ woman.

I am not, and never have been, beautiful. Never pretty or attractive. On a good day with some good light, I could possibly pass for striking.

This awareness has crippled my self esteem for years, to the point of developing a phobia of mirrors and pictures. I have no pictures of me from 14 until recently.

Tonight, on my way home from work, 2 young women got on the trains opposite me and started discussing and laughing loudly about how deformed and ugly my face I was.

I didn’t challenge them because I am middle aged and knackered and didn’t fancy my chances with two very loud, much younger women, but I realised I don’t actually care.

For so long, someone calling me ugly or unattractive to my face would have been my worst nightmare but it happened and instead of the world ending, I’ve realised I no longer care about my face or how it’s viewed.

I don’t know if it’s age, peri menopause, life experience or being too tired to care, but for the first time in my life I feel like I am more than the sum of my facial features and very much like who I am regardless of what I look like.

I feel free. Like a giant weight I have been dragging around my whole life has suddenly dropped off. I wish I’d had this realisation decades ago! I wish I could tell younger me my wonky face doesn’t actually matter in the grand scheme of things. I have a life I am proud to have created and many things to celebrate and not a single one of them relied on me having a conventional looking face.

So fellow ‘ugly’ women, please come join me on a ‘DGAF’ thread.

Reassurance about your face ‘not being that bad really’ is banned.

Celebration of all the many other things you are than your physical appearance encouraged!

"A person who has good thoughts cannot ever be ugly. You can have a wonky nose and a crooked mouth and a double chin and stick-out teeth, but if you have good thoughts it will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely."
Roald Dahl, The Twits

I will join the ugly thread, I'm also one of the overweight ugly, never been pretty kinda people but I have a lovely partner who I adore and a beautiful dc....what more can a fugly girl want!!!

Everyone starts with a blank canvas in my eyes .they then become beautiful once i see the beauty inside.
I have never instantly thought someone was ugly. who am I to judge? Kindness with a good heart goes a long way .as does a smile,
You definitely don't sound ugly to me OP.

FULL HOUSE

That took longer than usual, though.

When I was about 19 I went on holiday with a friend. We were sat at a bar and ordered drinks. The bartender made hers and said it was free because she was so beautiful, then turned to me and said 2.50 (or whatever the hell it cost, it's not the price I remember). The pain of that still hurts today and I'm 45.

In almost 50 years on this planet, I have seen very few truly ugly people - IMO everyone has something beautiful about them, and even those who don't conform to the conventional norm become more attractive once you get to know their inner beauty. Ugliness is on the inside.

I've always felt I had a nice face, but it turns out this was dependent on decent skin and eyebrows, and perimenopause has done for both of those. I've also carried a lot of extra weight my whole adult life, so now I have a lovely chin bulge. It's ok for me to refer to myself as a fat knacker, but it's devastating hearing it from random strangers trying to get a laugh from their arsehole mates. Sorry this happened to you, OP, I know what it's like.

I had a conversation with my child recently about knowing your worth and valuing others . I am far from pretty or photogenic, l have bags under my eyes, 3 chins, luckily for me l have nice skin.

l had another conversation with the same child last night because he called someone a Tw*t, l was shocked because we don’t use that word he heard it in school, l told him l was the worst word ever.

However………those two are absolute Tw*ts , l feel so sorry for them and the life lessons they have to come.

Good on you for knowing your worth l think you sound amazing.

It's ok for me to refer to myself as a fat knacker, but it's devastating hearing it from random strangers trying to get a laugh from their arsehole mates.

Don't call yourself a knacker.

I find this so wild.

I don’t consider myself to be ugly; I’m not up to every conventional beauty standard though and I recently found my face is super asymmetrical which was a bit throwing 😂

However, I genuinely can’t think of a time I have ever look at another woman and thought “they’re ugly” - I do however often find myself admiring conventionally beautiful features of other people.

I find it bizarre how someone brain can be wired to look at another person who is just moaning their own business and think they are ugly. - there are so many faces and features we all come across everyday I don’t know how you would really define being ‘ugly’ by looks alone?

even the term ugly makes me think of a persons personality rather than their looks.. like the two girls you mention who were brazen enough to laugh and make obvious comments about how someone else looks, that to me is ugly.. even if they were supermodel beautiful on the outside.

Meaning?

We always get that quote on these threads sooner or later.

Were they teenagers op? They can be insanely cruel and if young hopefully they will grow up and die inside recalling their behaviour.

My sister teachers teens and we laugh bitterly at some of their horrible words!

Please tell me no one has posted that facile Roald Dahl quote 🙄

Hate that our society is like this. I know when younger I got advantages due to my looks it sickened me then even more so now. Found myself hoping my dds would be attractive for their own sakes and was horrified at myself.

They must have been desperately insecure to openly criticise someone else's appearance on the train. Why would you even notice someone else so much anyway? Really odd behaviour.

That is so sad, I mean they are sad. No wonder they have to wear a ton of make-up and false lashes. When you are plain ugly on the inside you have to distract from that, because it seeps to the surface in the end.
I remember I was in Greece with a friend and we were buying something and one of the old men beside the one who was charging me (it was a market) said "h stella kai to stelaki" (the star and the monster). He probably thought we wouldn´t understand Greek, yep, we did. I pretended I hadn´t heard anything and my friend later said, not to beat myself up about it, she had this when she went out and about with more good looking girls like me... I had never thought about her like that and was shocked someone could be so nasty.

I have struggled with this for most of my life lol. I have a nose that leans to one side, and though I have nice colour eyes and freckles the shape and lean of my nose plus a small indent in my forehead (fell down the stairs as a child) means that those just overwhelm any positive facial qualities lol. I've always had people say shit to me in the street. I also have no photos of myself from ages 12 ish (the back of my head) to around age 24 and that's only because I now have 2 kids who thankfully do not share my features 😂

I don't think I'm ugly as such, but have always felt pretty invisible to the majority of people and men in particular. Tbh I think my issue was more untreated ADHD and related social difficulties. Nonetheless, I used to attach a lot of self worth to the way I was treated and valued (or not) by other people, and have now happily reached a point in life where I DGAF. I have a wonderful little family and I care deeply what they think about me, but outside of my actual real life at home, I honestly am not bothered in the slightest if a stranger or acquaintance thinks I'm pretty or ugly or thin or fat or funny or cool or awkward or whatever. I don't value outside opinions, good or bad. I suppose if someone pays me a compliment or shows they value me, I do appreciate that but it's from the perspective of appreciating them and their kindness and good heart as opposed to placing value on myself because someone else saw something they liked.

I think Helena Rubinstein once said that there are ugly woman, only lazy women.

I personally think this is true.

Most women I see that might be considered ugly just make no effort with their appearance, and just let themselves go.I myself would be considered average but putting a bit of effort in makes a huge difference to the may I look and feel about myself and also the way others treat me,
If you look like you respect and value yourself others ( for the most part) will treat you the same.

I don’t mean this to be offensive, more words of encouragement

I've been called ugly a lot over the years, it's very impolite and quite cruel but I'm not an idiot I know I am not nice to look at. I go through phases of being more or less bothered. At university I overheard some of the girls I lived with laughing about how I had obviously really made an effort and finding it funny that I thought I looked good. That one still brings tears to my eyes recalling it. It tapped in directly to what I had always thought - that it was actually worse to try to look better and less humiliating to just try to draw as little attention to myself as possible.

I don't feel like that now and quite enjoy clothes (I make my own) and fabrics and things. I am still very cautious about make-up in case I look like I think I look OK. It's so stupid I just cannot shake it.

Obviously confidence helps but if you are perceived as not good looking no shit your confidence is bashed too so it’s a vicious circle.

I see my teen without a moments self doubt or lack of confidence partly innate but largely because she is beautiful and the works reflects that back at her. My friends teens are struggling with anxiety and self doubt because they do not have that. I wish it wasn’t so. It’s brilliant if you move beyond caring but that’s a big ask of teens.

Unfortunate cross post with @bored1000 above there! I promise I am not lazy.

She was selling cosmetics, what do you think she was going to say?

Hmm, you may not like the quote but the person who bothered to post it was posting from a place of kindness and wanting offer comfort.
Don’t think they deserved to be jumped on for that, seems quite mean spirited

@Webex
Forget about those few bitch women you encountered a few years ago and continue to make the effort.
Most women who you might consider beautiful look very plain without makeup/ highlights etc, they make an effort so why shouldn’t you!
Go on, have some fun with makeup, you may surprise yourself, I’m sure you would look lovely, also a smile can immediately make someone look attractive.
There are brilliant tutorials on you tube