Abandoned at birth because of skin deformities, woman gets makeover

Irina Pavlutskaya was abandoned as a baby after she was born with rare physical deformities, the Daily Mail reports.

Children with even minor medical conditions or even easily treatable deformities are usually aborted in Russia or left to die once born. It is a miracle that she survived at all. Russia has an abortion rate two and a half times that of the United States and almost four times that of Germany. In 1920 the new communist regime legalized abortion becoming the first in the world to do so.

Make-up artist Ms. Goar Avetisyan learned about Pavlutskaya, who is Russian, while watching a popular Russian television talk show. She decided to give her a makeover to help her feel beautiful.

According to Russian media Irina suffers from vitiligo, a patchy loss of skin pigmentation, although her symptoms do not resemble the marks usually associated with the condition. Her marks are reportedly one of the reasons she was abandoned by her parents as a small child. When she appeared on Russian TV talk show Live with Andrey Malakhov her story immediately captured the nation’s hearts, and she was dubbed ‘leopard girl’. Although Irina does not discuss her skin condition or family in Goar’s video, she can be seen looking absolutely over the moon after her makeover.

She’s also been diagnosed with a rare condition called congenital melanocytic nevi that causes large moles to form all over her skin.

To make the woman feel beautiful, Avetisyan used a color corrector to cover up the dark moles, followed by foundation, mascara and other make-up, according to the report. Pavlutskaya also had her hair styled. A video of the makeover has attracted thousands of viewers.

Avetisyan said she wanted her to “see herself without [the moles] at least for a day.”