New type of RBF: Resting IBD Face

Are you OK?!

What’s wrong???

These may seem like innocuous, even caring and concerned, questions to ask a stranger or acquaintance. Yet they can be intrusive questions to expect someone to answer honestly unless that person is:

·      a friend or family member.

·      gushing blood or amniotic fluid.

·      crumpled on the floor desperately wailing in agony, like Henry and Karen after the cop raid in Goodfellas.

That’s because the answer might be:

·      My dog was hit by a car yesterday.

·      I was just diagnosed with cancer.

·      I just got broken up with via text message.

·      I was up all night with diarrhea and am worried I’m about to have more while you’re making me talk to you.

Now, let’s see if you can tell the difference between these three faces, left to right:

·      The first is a woman who just learned that her doggie daycare can’t seem to locate her puppy.

·      The second is a woman concentrating on a complicated work task on deadline.

·      The third is a woman with IBD just realizing she shouldn’t have eaten the lunch buffet.

They’re the same drawing that I just cut and pasted twice, so that wasn’t really fair. But doesn’t it seem to suit all three situations? Do any of these scenarios require intervention or commentary from passersby? Yet when called out on having this face, you’re supposed to lie and say you’re fine, nervously laugh a little about how you got called out about worrying your pretty little head about anything, and put on a smile. 

I’m a chronic face offender, apparently, based on the corrective comments I regularly get. I prefer BRF or “bitchy resting face” but the Internet and The New York Times have spoken – RBF (resting bitch face) is the recognized term for this unwelcome frowny face, and it’s a face and issue that’s not going away any time soon. The condition afflicts females exclusively, and the hallmark signs of this condition are the eye and mouth areas exhibiting signs associated with boredom, annoyance, sadness, disgust, and/or just generalized bitchdom.

RBF is already an obnoxious issue for women in general, but when you have an illness that can make this face more intense and more frequent, it’s going to define more and more of your daily life.

Resting Bitchy IBD Face is the phenomenon of having RBF more often and more intensely because of having Crohn’s or UC.

Resting Bitchy IBD Face is the phenomenon of having RBF more often and more intensely because of having Crohn’s or UC.

And that leads us to RBIBDF, an even more insidious and under-recognized social blight. Resting Bitchy IBD Face is the phenomenon of having RBF more often and more intensely because of having Crohn’s or UC. IBD can lead to exhaustion, pain, bloating, dehydration, and low mood – all of which can take a toll on a sufferer’s facial expressions. People with IBD may also happen to need to eat many small meals and use the restroom frequently, which means you may often see them asocially eating alone at their desks, or suspiciously visiting the facilities for the fourth time that morning; fortunately, this gives you more opportunities to chastise them for their incorrect faces and feelings.

By the grace of the IBD gods, I finally got walls added onto my open-air cubicle, so my face choices aren’t on full display for co-workers to verbally vote on. But the hallways (and just inviting yourself into my cube without knocking) are apparently still fair game. So instead of fighting it, correcting people or explaining my face, I've been using my RBF as a social repellent – a sick-and-tired girl's best friend. 

Wow, why are you concentrating on your computer screen so hard? 
Face.

I’m just teasing you! Don’t be so serious! 
FACE.

Come on, can’t you just give me a smile?! And why are you always eating or headed to the bathroom when I see you?! 
FACEFACEFACE.


Before you go, I feel like I need to add that I’m not a miserable person. Look, I’m smiling right now!

But the point is that the absence of smiling is not sadness or bitchiness. Sometimes it’s queasiness or exhaustion or concentration or the need for a toilet. Smiling can be exhausting when it feels like a job, in addition to the job you’re actually getting paid for. Which includes reviewing spreadsheet documents. And it would be kind of creepy if I smiled while reading spreadsheets.

Please post any photos or examples of great RBFs or RIBDBFs below.