A 37-year-old woman from Jilin, China, has gone viral after revealing that she hadn’t properly removed makeup in over two decades, which ultimately caused a severe rash on her face.
Known only as Gao, the Chinese woman took to social media to share her story as a warning to others to properly cleanse their face regularly after putting on makeup. She herself allegedly failed to do so for over 20 years, which ultimately led to a serious allergic reaction that left her face inflamed. Gao said that she becme fascinated with her mother’s lipstick in her early teenage years and started wearing makeup when she was 15. However, she found removing the makeup “too troublesome,” instead going by the principle, “why bother removing the makeup if you’re going to put it back on the next day?” So she only rinsed her face with water before going to bed and applied more makeup the next day.
Although she had dealt with acne over the years, Gao said her skin was in relatively good condition until earlier this year when she suffered a serious allergic reaction that caused her face to swell and deform to the point where she became unrecognizable. Instead of seeing a dermatologist, she went to a medical aesthetics clinic for a “skin booster” injection that she claims only made things worse, adding a purple hue to her skin.
“The itch is unbearable… I hide at home every day. I don’t dare to go out,” Gao confessed in a video that has been doing the rounds on social media. “My whole face is wrinkled and hideous. I don’t dare to step outside, meet people, or make friends. “At its worst, the rash feels like thousands of tiny ants crawling on my face.”
Growing up in a modest household, Gao sometimes used cheap foundation, which she suspects contributed to her current condition, but dermatologists are skeptical that makeup could cause her symptoms, no matter how poor her face cleaning ritual was. Some believe that her symptoms were caused by a host of other causes, such as rosacea and dermatitis.
“Going twenty-two years without a proper cleanse is bad, sure — but what we’re seeing here is more complex,” one dermatologist said. “There could be a mix of harsh products, possible steroid misuse, or repeated injections involved.”
Gao’s case sparked a debate on Weibo, China’s version of X, with many wondering if improperly removed makeup could cause this sort of allergic reaction, or if the 37-year-old woman did something else to damage her skin. Some people even accused her of using her condition to attract attention and views.
