Phyllida
“I acquired my facial difference in a car accident in 2015, I was age 22. I was volunteering in Ghana and we were travelling overnight in a van when we crashed. I woke up and put my hands to my face and immediately realised it was cut open.”
On the first day of her trip to Ghana, Phyllida Swift suffered facial injuries and a broken spine in a horrific car crash. She told us of her struggles, at first, to accept her facial differences.
“Being a 22-year-old girl, midway through university, it was a big adjustment. Suddenly I looked like a completely different person and had this thing stamped across my face, that I knew society largely saw as ugly and not something desirable for a woman. Something that is seen as a mark of a villain or a vulnerable person. So that was a massive adjustment for me, particularly at that age.”
With large amounts of media attention, Phyllida struggled at times to accept her appearance. Her quest to change society’s representation of people with facial differences began by first coming to accept and love her own.
“Suddenly having facial scars and looking in the mirror, I almost saw two sides of my face, I had to re-learn how to do my makeup. There was the side of my face that I recognised and there was the side of my face that I tried to not really look at. It didn't help that they sewed half my eyebrow back in the wrong place, so I couldn't really do my eyebrows in a symmetrical way anymore. I tried to hide as best as I could for a period. I tried to have a fringe cut in to cover up as much of my scar as I possibly could. For a time, I stopped wearing bright clothes or wanting to attract attention to myself and I just became a bit more introverted.”
Phyllida began working with Changing Faces as a campaigner to spread her message of equality for all, regardless of facial differences. Through drive and passion, she strived to spread her word near and far.
“I started to notice the stares or the comments from people that were well-meaning, but that just infuriated me.
I hate the idea that someone might think ‘Oh, she'll never feel beautiful again’ or ‘She’ll never feel confident again with that on her face’. It was that internal kind of dialogue that lit this fire within me to want to prove people wrong and say, ‘I will feel confident and I will feel beautiful’.”
Her impressive work with Changing Faces saw her appointed CEO of Face Equality International. Through her new role, she has targeted how the media portrays people with facial differences, intent on changing the narrative and public perceptions.
“I think the way that facial differences are represented and having positive normalised role models in the public eye is vital. I had a few people like Katie Piper that I could look up to in the media who were out there, sharing their stories whilst being successful and creative.
She works tirelessly to ensure that the stories of people living with facial differences, across the world, are represented. Only through engaging with communities can the stigma of facial differences be addressed in different societies.
“For centuries, people with facial differences have either been forcibly hidden away, hidden from the media, or we've internalised this idea from society that we should remain hidden, that we're not deserving of a place in society. This is why we are proudly saying ‘we will not hide’, to show solidarity with those that are going through that very normal process of feeling that they might want to hide. We will show them there are actually opportunities out there. We want to be seen, we want to be heard, and we deserve to have our faces seen in every aspect of society.”
“Around the world, there are children who are hidden away for some or all their lives. There are children that are banned from attending school because they're told that they'll scare the other children. These are real-life stories that are neglected, hidden and not talked about in global society. The facial difference communities are absent from the public eye and lack representation on the big screen, but also representation in terms of seeking high-level roles across society. In government, we just don't see enough people with facial differences performing those high-level roles and having the opportunities that everybody should be afforded. That is why we are coming out with this defined statement. We will not hide.”
It took Phyllida time to accept and learn to love her facial differences. She is determined to change the narrative of acceptance, for society to embrace equality for people with facial differences and for those with facial differences to love themselves.
“We’ve been sold this lie that there is something wrong with a facial difference, that we exist solely to be fixed, whether through plastic surgery, through filters or hiding away. We are hidden in magazines, hidden from advertising, which just perpetuates this idea that we are not deserving of space in society on equal footing. What we're trying to say here is that facial difference is not a bad thing. We do not need to be fixed. Our voices deserve to be heard and our faces deserve to be seen. Unfiltered. We are proud to be ourselves.”
FIND OUT MORE
Face Equality International
Face Equality International is an alliance of Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs), charities and support groups which are working at national, regional or international levels to promote the campaign for ‘face equality’.
To learn more about Face Equality International, click here.
Changing Faces
Changing Faces provide life-changing mental health, wellbeing and skin camouflage services. They work to transform understanding and acceptance of visible difference, and campaign to reduce prejudice and discrimination.
To learn more about Face Equality International, click here.
Source: https://www.changingfaces.org.uk