As I got older, my grandmother on my father’s side (who wasn’t as dark skinned as I was) reinforced the message that light skin was better. She bought me a bleaching face cream designed for lightening darker splotches of skin, but she didn’t want me to use it on spots. She hoped I’d use it on my whole face. And even though it didn’t have a strong bleach component, I knew why she was giving it to me: she hoped that cream would make my skin lighter. Because it was my grandmother, because I loved her, I used that cream all through college, believing it made my skin a shade lighter. Believing it
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