Dramatic, visible birthmarks
April 20, 2013 4:41 PM Subscribe
Australian photographer Natalie McComas has undertaken a project exploring and celebrating individuals with birthmarks.
The person in the photo has Klippel–Trénaunay–Weber syndrome, which you may remember also affects golfer Casey Martin and Smashing Pumpkins singer Billy Corgan.
Port wine stain birthmarks are just one of several KT symptoms; other famous people with these marks include Mikhail Gorbachev and Tina Turner; Gorbachev was notable in part for refusing to conceal or remove his PWS despite its prominence and the extent to which people became fixated on it.
I incidentally learned about this from the Canadian organization AboutFace, which is awesome for several reasons, particularly that they support everyone in Canada with facial differences (not just birthmarks,) and run a fundraising event best described as, seriously, skydiving for charity.
The person in the photo has Klippel–Trénaunay–Weber syndrome, which you may remember also affects golfer Casey Martin and Smashing Pumpkins singer Billy Corgan.
Port wine stain birthmarks are just one of several KT symptoms; other famous people with these marks include Mikhail Gorbachev and Tina Turner; Gorbachev was notable in part for refusing to conceal or remove his PWS despite its prominence and the extent to which people became fixated on it.
I incidentally learned about this from the Canadian organization AboutFace, which is awesome for several reasons, particularly that they support everyone in Canada with facial differences (not just birthmarks,) and run a fundraising event best described as, seriously, skydiving for charity.
Am I missing something, or is the project just the one photo so far?
posted by The corpse in the library at 5:36 PM on April 20, 2013 [16 favorites]
posted by The corpse in the library at 5:36 PM on April 20, 2013 [16 favorites]
I've got a large port wine stain on my right shin, which looks from where I see it a bit like a slightly bent-up state of Florida. I wish I'd had someone to tell me it was normal or beautiful when I was younger. I'm middle-aged and still self-conscious about my birthmark when I wear shorts or skirts.
posted by immlass at 5:38 PM on April 20, 2013 [2 favorites]
posted by immlass at 5:38 PM on April 20, 2013 [2 favorites]
I was born with a large hemangioma in the perfect shape of an outstretched hand... positioned right on my forehead. Evidently, I was facepalming at an early age, right in the womb.
I was never embarrassed of it, but being a rare case where it did not regress in childhood, the thing became increasingly problematic. After several failed liquid nitrogen treatments to keep it under control (I never truly knew what cold was til I went through that), the plastic surgeons decided to take it off when I was 18.
You'd think they could nick it right off, like an errant mole, but feel your forehead and how little skin there is to work with. So, procedure #1 was to insert a skin expander balloon under my scalp, which got filled with a saline solution (administrated via syringe) once a week, slowly streeetcchhhiinnggg the skin.
I still remember sitting in the plastic surgeon's waiting room before each session -- it was a humbling experience, sitting among children going through much more invasive procedures for things like horrific facial burns. I felt my little hand-print wasn't worth the trouble, even if it was growing increasingly uglier by the year. (In hindsight, I assume the doctors were concerned about Kasabach-Merritt syndrome -- which Klippel–Trénaunay–Weber syndrome can also lead to, it seems).
After about a month of saline treatments, the joke was that the surgeons had put the breast implant in the wrong place. Finally about a month or two later, the final procedure was to remove both the balloon and the hemangioma. I'd never really gotten used to the persistent headache and it was a relief to have that mass (and the added mass to treat it) off of my head. Though the removal of the drain from under my scalp -- done about a week into healing -- was so intensely painful and wrong feeling, I almost punched my surgeon as a visceral reaction.
I actually miss the novelty of such an identifying mark, but the trade-off, a clean bill of health and a fairly interesting 4" scar ("my scar is twinging... Voldemort must be near..."), is just fine by me.
posted by Wossname at 5:54 PM on April 20, 2013 [12 favorites]
I was never embarrassed of it, but being a rare case where it did not regress in childhood, the thing became increasingly problematic. After several failed liquid nitrogen treatments to keep it under control (I never truly knew what cold was til I went through that), the plastic surgeons decided to take it off when I was 18.
You'd think they could nick it right off, like an errant mole, but feel your forehead and how little skin there is to work with. So, procedure #1 was to insert a skin expander balloon under my scalp, which got filled with a saline solution (administrated via syringe) once a week, slowly streeetcchhhiinnggg the skin.
I still remember sitting in the plastic surgeon's waiting room before each session -- it was a humbling experience, sitting among children going through much more invasive procedures for things like horrific facial burns. I felt my little hand-print wasn't worth the trouble, even if it was growing increasingly uglier by the year. (In hindsight, I assume the doctors were concerned about Kasabach-Merritt syndrome -- which Klippel–Trénaunay–Weber syndrome can also lead to, it seems).
After about a month of saline treatments, the joke was that the surgeons had put the breast implant in the wrong place. Finally about a month or two later, the final procedure was to remove both the balloon and the hemangioma. I'd never really gotten used to the persistent headache and it was a relief to have that mass (and the added mass to treat it) off of my head. Though the removal of the drain from under my scalp -- done about a week into healing -- was so intensely painful and wrong feeling, I almost punched my surgeon as a visceral reaction.
I actually miss the novelty of such an identifying mark, but the trade-off, a clean bill of health and a fairly interesting 4" scar ("my scar is twinging... Voldemort must be near..."), is just fine by me.
posted by Wossname at 5:54 PM on April 20, 2013 [12 favorites]
justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow: Geographic comparisons are very common for those of us with birthmarks (probably because PWSs are flat and tend to have irregular edges, matching what you see on most maps.) Mine looks a lot like Africa.
The corpse in the library: She's shooting and recruiting participants (which is one major purpose of releasing that particular photo; she's getting quite a bit of attention now in the birthmarks community because of it.) Not too clear on when the rest of the photos will be published.
immlass: This is one of the reasons I'm glad my parents never pushed me to wear makeup; I never had a chance to become obsessive/self-conscious when it came to how I dress, at least. I do wish I had met people with birthmarks as a kid, though. I sort of thought it was just me and Gorbachev.
posted by SMPA at 5:55 PM on April 20, 2013 [1 favorite]
The corpse in the library: She's shooting and recruiting participants (which is one major purpose of releasing that particular photo; she's getting quite a bit of attention now in the birthmarks community because of it.) Not too clear on when the rest of the photos will be published.
immlass: This is one of the reasons I'm glad my parents never pushed me to wear makeup; I never had a chance to become obsessive/self-conscious when it came to how I dress, at least. I do wish I had met people with birthmarks as a kid, though. I sort of thought it was just me and Gorbachev.
posted by SMPA at 5:55 PM on April 20, 2013 [1 favorite]
My son has one just behind his hairline near his temple. I keep forgetting that I'm going to have to tell him about it, because dude's going bald in 25-30 years, and hoo boy is he going to be surprised.
posted by middleclasstool at 6:05 PM on April 20, 2013 [1 favorite]
posted by middleclasstool at 6:05 PM on April 20, 2013 [1 favorite]
Interesting! I've got a largish port wine birthmark on my thigh. Received occasional remarks on it when I was a kid; still people will occasionally ask "what happened???" as if it were a burn; but mostly not a biggie.
This projects reminds me a bit of Positive Exposure, which is about celebrating people with genetic syndromes. Fascinating story of a high flying fashion photographer advocating beauty in everyone.
posted by Sublimity at 6:41 PM on April 20, 2013 [1 favorite]
This projects reminds me a bit of Positive Exposure, which is about celebrating people with genetic syndromes. Fascinating story of a high flying fashion photographer advocating beauty in everyone.
posted by Sublimity at 6:41 PM on April 20, 2013 [1 favorite]
I wasn't aware of how common these are. Thanks for sharing.
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 6:46 PM on April 20, 2013
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 6:46 PM on April 20, 2013
I have a birthmark on the side of the bridge of my nose (an oval indentation, slightly discolored and about an inch long) but it's mostly covered up by the nose-clipy things on my glasses. I've been wearing glasses since third grade, so very few people outside my family even know I have it. Some of those who have seen it after knowing me a while do a double-take. Not out of disgust or anything, just surprise.
My eyesight is pretty bad, so it doesn't seem noticeable to me when I see it while shaving with my glasses off. But I can see how seeing a new feature on someone's face could be a little jarring.
posted by Groundhog Week at 6:47 PM on April 20, 2013
My eyesight is pretty bad, so it doesn't seem noticeable to me when I see it while shaving with my glasses off. But I can see how seeing a new feature on someone's face could be a little jarring.
posted by Groundhog Week at 6:47 PM on April 20, 2013
One of my daughters has a small, thumb-print size one but I don't think I'll suggest this project to her - it's on her labia majora. It would bleed when she got a diaper rash.
posted by _paegan_ at 7:25 PM on April 20, 2013
posted by _paegan_ at 7:25 PM on April 20, 2013
'The person in the photo' is also Patience Hodgson, frontwoman for The Grates, an Aussie rockband. I went to school with her and oddly enough the most memorable thing about her was her speaking voice, not singing and not the birthmark.
posted by geek anachronism at 7:26 PM on April 20, 2013
posted by geek anachronism at 7:26 PM on April 20, 2013
Sublimity, your link is wrong - it should go to PositiveExposure.org
posted by jacalata at 8:43 PM on April 20, 2013 [1 favorite]
posted by jacalata at 8:43 PM on April 20, 2013 [1 favorite]
I went to school with a pair of twins. The younger of the two had been a surprise at birth, because she was significantly underweight and hadn't been seen on ultrasounds. Her heart was weak due to a hole in it, so no fetal heartbeat detected, either. But the point of this comment is, she had a rather large hemangioma on the right side of her nose, and for years it was the way people told her apart from her twin sister. I think it did a lot to her self esteem, on top of everything else, but I always found it very lovely. I wish I could have told her that then, but I was very low on that social ladder, being COVERED in very vivid freckles from head to toe (Why yes, my spots do go all the way down).
posted by strixus at 8:47 PM on April 20, 2013
posted by strixus at 8:47 PM on April 20, 2013
I love people's birthmarks. I feel horrible that they can be a source of embarrassment. This is wrong: they are beautiful.
posted by theredpen at 9:00 PM on April 20, 2013 [1 favorite]
posted by theredpen at 9:00 PM on April 20, 2013 [1 favorite]
I suppose my two tiny birthmarks don't count. They've never been a source of embarrassment for me, rather fascination. One is on my knee, and I always found it fascinating how no matter how badly I scraped that knee in my many childhood accidents, the birthmark would always survive.
posted by clockbound at 5:29 AM on April 21, 2013
posted by clockbound at 5:29 AM on April 21, 2013
My birthmark, while not a port wine or similar, did cause a lot of social hardship when I was young - the fist size lack of pigmentation on my scalp gives me a nice bright white streak of hair down the left side, earning me the nickname "skunk" in grade school.
posted by _paegan_ at 5:05 PM on April 21, 2013
posted by _paegan_ at 5:05 PM on April 21, 2013
I could send her a photo of arse if she likes..
I do seriously have a birthmark upon one of the cheeks, she could add to the library
posted by Merlin The Happy Pig at 7:18 PM on April 21, 2013
I do seriously have a birthmark upon one of the cheeks, she could add to the library
posted by Merlin The Happy Pig at 7:18 PM on April 21, 2013
My niece has a large port-wine-stain birthmark on the side of her face; it's quite noticeable. When she was a baby, it was a raised hemangioma, but laser treatments or whatever was state of the art 15 years ago debulked it a lot. They also made it lighter, but by no means inconspicuous. At that point, they told her parents that further treatment would have to wait until her head was its adult size.
She grew up to be a very pretty young lady, slim and blonde and bubbly and all those hallmarks of conventional attractiveness. She runs with a pretty, popular crowd in school. And when she was 15, they measured her head and face as they always did, discovered that the size hadn't changed in the previous year, and said "OK! Now we can finish getting that birthmark taken care of!"
"Um, why?" she said. "It's part of my face, this is what I look like."
"Uh. What?" said my sister-in-law and her husband, who are lovely people and excellent parents but to whom this answer never occurred.
"Look, *I* don't care that it's there. It's really useful, actually, because people who make a big weird deal of it aren't people I want in my life, and it makes them show their hand early. It's part of me. Getting rid of it would be undergoing painful, expensive surgery to make other people more comfortable with my appearance, and that's not how I roll."
So they didn't. Now she's 18, and if she has any second thoughts about that decision, she hasn't communicated them in any way. She's a really remarkable woman; I can't begin to imagine having that kind of confidence in myself and my identity at 15.
posted by KathrynT at 11:13 PM on April 21, 2013 [7 favorites]
She grew up to be a very pretty young lady, slim and blonde and bubbly and all those hallmarks of conventional attractiveness. She runs with a pretty, popular crowd in school. And when she was 15, they measured her head and face as they always did, discovered that the size hadn't changed in the previous year, and said "OK! Now we can finish getting that birthmark taken care of!"
"Um, why?" she said. "It's part of my face, this is what I look like."
"Uh. What?" said my sister-in-law and her husband, who are lovely people and excellent parents but to whom this answer never occurred.
"Look, *I* don't care that it's there. It's really useful, actually, because people who make a big weird deal of it aren't people I want in my life, and it makes them show their hand early. It's part of me. Getting rid of it would be undergoing painful, expensive surgery to make other people more comfortable with my appearance, and that's not how I roll."
So they didn't. Now she's 18, and if she has any second thoughts about that decision, she hasn't communicated them in any way. She's a really remarkable woman; I can't begin to imagine having that kind of confidence in myself and my identity at 15.
posted by KathrynT at 11:13 PM on April 21, 2013 [7 favorites]
I have a birthmark on my knee the exact shape of Scotland. My surname is Scottish. If my life was a fantasy movie this would mean I was meant to rule the country.
My sister has a port-wine mark on her back that kinda looks like Madagascar. Dunno what THAT means.
posted by lineofsight at 7:14 AM on April 22, 2013 [3 favorites]
My sister has a port-wine mark on her back that kinda looks like Madagascar. Dunno what THAT means.
posted by lineofsight at 7:14 AM on April 22, 2013 [3 favorites]
Myself, my father, and his father all have the same birthmark on our right thigh. It looks like a brown egg, oval.
The very first time I was socially aware of it was on the first day of Kindergarden. I had on shorts that showed it, and all the other kids thought it was a tick, and that I was gross for leaving it on me. I always made sure to wear shorts long enough to cover it, after that.
That day is also the first time I thought to myself "Geez, I think I am smarter than everybody in this room!".
posted by It is better for you not to know. at 8:53 AM on April 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
The very first time I was socially aware of it was on the first day of Kindergarden. I had on shorts that showed it, and all the other kids thought it was a tick, and that I was gross for leaving it on me. I always made sure to wear shorts long enough to cover it, after that.
That day is also the first time I thought to myself "Geez, I think I am smarter than everybody in this room!".
posted by It is better for you not to know. at 8:53 AM on April 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
It is better for you not to know.: "Myself, my father, and his father all have the same birthmark on our right thigh. It looks like a brown egg, oval."
...That's creepy. My sister has the same birthmark (I'm guessing) and so does my daughter.
posted by geek anachronism at 8:36 PM on April 22, 2013
...That's creepy. My sister has the same birthmark (I'm guessing) and so does my daughter.
posted by geek anachronism at 8:36 PM on April 22, 2013
The other day I saw a young lady with a port-wine birthmark on her forearm and wrist. On the same arm, just below her shoulder, she had the tattoo of a spilled wine glass.
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey at 6:13 PM on April 23, 2013 [4 favorites]
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey at 6:13 PM on April 23, 2013 [4 favorites]
Re; wine glass tattoo: Oh, that's brilliant.
I have a big port wine stain on my cheek and I regularly fail to remember which side it's on. Nobody ever made a big deal about it when I was a kid, and nobody ever talked to me about cosmetically altering it (aside from one of my brothers who is more of a fan of plastic surgery than most). I forget it's there much of the time. I assume it's part of why people often have an easier time remembering me than I do remembering most people. I was not a very femme girl, so I never wore makeup (except when on stage), but I think the birthmark served as a barrier to makeup since it's pretty much "no base" or "get out the concealer like they used on Zombie Boy. Also, it seems to have resulted in one of my earlobes being slightly larger/longer than the other, so my pierced ears never looked even.
My mother and grandmother and I all had/have the same weird big-tick-sized skin tag on our torsos. It's like a legacy.
posted by rmd1023 at 1:26 PM on April 25, 2013 [1 favorite]
I have a big port wine stain on my cheek and I regularly fail to remember which side it's on. Nobody ever made a big deal about it when I was a kid, and nobody ever talked to me about cosmetically altering it (aside from one of my brothers who is more of a fan of plastic surgery than most). I forget it's there much of the time. I assume it's part of why people often have an easier time remembering me than I do remembering most people. I was not a very femme girl, so I never wore makeup (except when on stage), but I think the birthmark served as a barrier to makeup since it's pretty much "no base" or "get out the concealer like they used on Zombie Boy. Also, it seems to have resulted in one of my earlobes being slightly larger/longer than the other, so my pierced ears never looked even.
My mother and grandmother and I all had/have the same weird big-tick-sized skin tag on our torsos. It's like a legacy.
posted by rmd1023 at 1:26 PM on April 25, 2013 [1 favorite]
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"Reagan wears the flag of his country on a pin on his chest, but Gorbachev wears a map of his country on his head."
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 5:06 PM on April 20, 2013