“Let me tell you a story. I once met a little girl and her dad. The girl had white patches on her face, knuckles, and hand. I asked the child’s dad if he had sufficient finances for the treatment after realising that they were struggling economically. He replied by saying that god would heal his daughter,” said Mahesh Gowda while talking about the lack of awareness people had about Vitiligo.
Gowda further added, the child's father himself had no idea about the condition and failed to see how this might affect the child psychologically in the long run. “Following various rituals, visiting temple to temple instead of educating the child, will only force the kid to lose her belief in god and religion when she realises that her condition isn’t improving. Henceforth educate your child, do not mix culture and medical treatments,” he stated.
Mahesh Gowda is an actor, director, and producer from Bengaluru. When he’s not working, he takes on the roles of a martial artist and a traveller too. He is often seen using social media as a platform to spread awareness about vitiligo, a skin condition he was diagnosed with many years ago.
Vitiligo is a skin condition that causes the loss of skin colour in blotches. It occurs when pigment-producing cells die or stop functioning.
While talking about the superstitions which he has had to face because of the condition he says, “Every religion has superstition. When I was in London, I visited a church because of a friend. They gave me ashes to apply to my body. My friend was of Spanish descent, and she had superstitious beliefs too. I have applied 'Darga ki mitti' also. Everyone holds some kind of superstitious belief.”
Mahesh said his childhood was pretty normal. Of course, he experienced some amount of bullying, but that didn’t define his relationship with his body. “Bullying will happen anyway, no matter how you look, bullying will always happen. But we will have our own introversion as individuals,” he said when asked to recall his experiences as a child dealing with vitiligo.
“The word hate is a very strong word. There are situations in your life where you struggle to find out the meaning of what is happening around you,” he said while talking about how he dealt with self-hate.
“When someone comments on your body, you contemplate in your mind, and because of social media, these strong words like "hate", comparing people to animals, started getting stronger.”
The director grew up in the '90s, a time when awareness about the importance of self-love was limited. Nobody told people of his age group how important it was to love oneself. “We didn’t know what Vitiligo was, and where it came from. I was in great confusion about why people should have something like this on their skin. There was no awareness about vitiligo,” he further added. "Thinking about society and hiding your own skin is the most dangerous thing," he said.
“Doctors, in the past, often advised patients to cover their skin with makeup. They probably said this to motivate you or keep your spirits high. But I don’t think doctors in present times would do this." He spoke about Prarthana Jagan, another social media influencer who raises awareness about vitiligo. He noted that there was a time when she used makeup to hide the affected areas of her skin. She now wears makeup to enhance her beauty rather than conceal her vitiligo. Speaking about his own experiences, he said, “I didn’t use makeup. Instead, I wore only full-sleeved clothes to cover my hands.”
The filmmaker saw the first signs of vitiligo at the onset of puberty. “There are two instances when vitiligo appears on one’s skin," he said. “One is before puberty, and the other is during middle age after menopause." He added, "The onset of vitiligo is directly proportional to stress, sleep cycles, food habits, and other external factors. Depression and suppressed emotions are also major causes of increased vitiligo."
When asked about at what age vitiligo appeared on his body, he said, “I completely remember what happened. It wasn’t intense at the beginning, but it remained on my body for a couple of years," he said, recalling the first-time patches that appeared on his body. "Initially, people around me asked me what was happening. My family remained neutral. It was because of the people around me that I started taking treatment. It showed some results but did not cure me completely."
Research on vitiligo says that there is no complete cure for the disease, and it will keep reappearing. "When I got a cut on my elbow, it did not turn into the colour of my skin, instead it appeared as a white patch," he said. There are different kinds of vitiligo and Mahesh Gowda suffers from conditional vitiligo where patches appear on some parts of the body and do not spread.
One of the biggest challenges that people with vitiligo face is finding a partner who understands their condition. “Because of our own insecurities, we think nobody will accept us. And even if we find someone who does, their immediate families might have a problem. This sabotages our chances at relationships,” he said. “However, this is changing with Gen Zs. I know so many people with vitiligo who are happily married and are accepted and loved unconditionally by their partners.”
However, he says that the ‘influencer generation’ today does not highlight the right issues. They term every human emotion as bullying. He believes that it takes away from the importance of the subject at hand. People should spread more awareness about such issues, notes.
He often wonders why the government or even NGOs don’t talk about it. That’s why, during the lockdown in 2021, Mahesh Gowda started an Instagram page, @thescarmanofficial, where he talks about everything related to his journey as someone with vitiligo.
You can also check out his YouTube page to know more about him.
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