A beautiful woman admits she has the beautiful woman syndrome

Hello all,

I am a girl who can put her hand up and say she has BWS! Yes that's right you heard me! The reason I know this? Let me tell you a little secret, I grew up ugly! I know what it's like to be treated like a second-class citizen for being fat and unattractive because that's how all the girls at my bitchy all-girl's school made me feel. On top of that I never had a boyfriend till I was 20 and even then I couldn't believe that someone found me attractive.

This model is not the one who submitted the story. The author sent her picture to me, and while she is exceptionally attractive, she preferred to remain anonymous.

It happened when I was 18: the puppy fat melted away, my braces removed and a new haircut transformed me from an awkward chubby girl to someone who was considered beautiful. In truth I have never been the same person again. At first I loved it; suddenly I was the girl I had always wanted to be and I presumed stupidly that life would be forever wonderful from then on. I became lazy, petulant, selfish, spoiled and had an addiction to looking at myself in every reflective surface I could find. I couldn't even concentrate on what people were saying to me anymore because all I could think about was how beautiful I was.

The other half of me secretly hated the person I had become and deliberately found the tiniest faults in my face and body in order to stay grounded but it made me even more self-absorbed. This followed by a few years of deliberately eating to excess to make myself less intimidating to others and less distracted by my new “gift.”

Of course it didn't last and once again I became addicted to being beautiful, but let me tell you one truth my dear friends: never think that we are happy and secure because we are not. We have to be number one, the center of adoration constantly, own ravenous egos that must be fed at all times and we live in constant fear of aging.

Once I was a bright spark who dreamed of becoming a doctor; now I dream of becoming a wife to a millionaire because, quite frankly, I know I can and that is my attitude to many things in life.

But one thing that must be kept in mind is that being beautiful means that you are no longer seen as a human being and so you are no longer treated like one. Female “friends” stab you in the back at the drop of a hat, boyfriends dump you and use you and the guys who would actually treat you OK never have the guts to even ask you out. People want you to be stupid so they tell themselves that you are because they can never accept that someone better looking than them could be smarter, wittier or more talented than they are. You know what? Sometimes they are! But I consider myself to be fortunate enough to have grown up ugly in a family where looks don't matter. I never fulfilled my potential but I had 18 years of being a dweeb to develop a personality that I am pretty proud of some of the time. On top of that I have the guts to admit that I'm beautiful and that I have let it go to my head. Sometimes I wish I could turn back the clock and change the transformation but I am too attached to this shallow addiction that may some day destroy my soul. Even now I berate myself for choosing to make myself ugly again as I missed out on precious time to be beautiful and adored. Once you know what that feels like you will fall deep into the river of Narcissus my friend, I do hope you can swim. Thank you for your time!