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Man Is Overcome With Emotion After Finding A Plaster That Matches His Skin Tone

Marianne Eloise

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Man Is Overcome With Emotion After Finding A Plaster That Matches His Skin Tone

Featured Image Credit: Dominique Apollon

Many of us put on "skin-coloured" plasters without having to think twice about whether or not they're going to be suitable for our skin tone.

But not everyone is so lucky, as one man has revealed in an emotional Twitter thread about finally finding a plaster that matches his complexion.

California man Dominique Apollon's tweet has now gone viral, with many people while others admitting they hadn't been aware of the issue in the first place.

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Posting on Twitter, Dominique Apollon, the vice president of research at nonprofit Race Forward, said: "It's taken me 45 trips around the sun, but for the first time in my life I know what it feels like to have a 'band-aid' in my own skin tone.

"You can barely even spot it in the first image. For real I'm holding back tears."

He followed up, saying: "This felt like belonging. Like feeling valued. Sadness for my younger self and millions of kids of color, esp black kids. Like a reminder of countless spaces where my skin is still not welcomed. Feared. Hated. Like, 'Why am I really thinking all this 'bout an effing band-aid?'"

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Speaking to Buzzfeed News, Dominique said: "as a black person, I'm not used to seeing products geared to me in national online retailers. The default is typically some type of Caucasian skin tone."

He added that he wasn't "overly eager" to try the bandage in a specialty shade, but was surprised when he put it on. "I could hardly see it. It just blended so perfectly in a way that if I was walking into a room, no one would even notice it was there," he said to BuzzFeed.

Dominique followed up on Twitter to say that he had bought Tru-Colour bandages, which are available in a variety of skin tones. He said he had started to feel sad that "I'd spent my entire life - 45 years - perhaps without ever having experienced that before.

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"It's impossible to say, but how might I have felt if I'd had that experience of care as a kid," he said. "It's a product that said to me, 'We see you. you're valued.'"


Responding to Dominique's tweets, some people said that wearing plasters was the first time they were "made aware of 'race'" as children. Others said that they remembered being upset that every day products in "flesh" tones like crayons did not match their skin.

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One person who had never realised the impact this could have said: " I work in a school and because of your tweet I just purchased a pack of TruColor bandages to have on hand. It's a small thing that might make a big difference to a child".

Dominique's post has had an overwhelmingly positive response, and sheds light on just how much of a widespread impact these small changes can have.

Marianne Eloise
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