Camila Coelho Shares More About Her Struggle with Epilepsy

Photography by Mich Cardin

As New York Fashion Week is in full spin, designers have been taking fashion insiders on some major field trips around the city. From the American Museum of Natural History to the New York Public Library, these cultural escapades are a major highlight in the midst of a very hectic (and wet) fashion week. 

On the fourth day of fashion week, L’OFFICIEL USA met up with Camila Coelho as she got ready for the Oscar de la Renta Fall 2020 show. While photographer Mich Cardin artfully captured the fashion entrepreneur and influencer's journey throughout the evening, we got a deeper look at her busy and complex life. The Brazilian bombshell shared some self-care tips and beauty secrets, as well as opening up about her struggles with epilepsy, which she has been hiding from the public since she was nine years old but just shared yesterday in honor of International Epilepsy Day. With more than 65 million people affected by epilepsy worldwide, Coelho wants to use her platform to break the stigma around epilepsy and is hoping to inspire those affected to share their stories as well. Read on to learn more about Coelho's struggles, her career, and her desire to make a positive impact on the world. 

What are your best self-care tips to get you through NYFW? 
First of all, getting rest and sleep. I think when you've rested, everything works better. Your mind, your body, and your skin look better. The hardest thing for me [during fashion week] is trying to get sleep. So if I have something at night, I try not to have an early morning because the rest of my health is so important. So that’s number one. And then drinking lots of water. And since we do so much glam and apply so much makeup onto the skin, I really try to take care of it and do masks at night. I try to maintain my steady skincare routine. 

Do you have any Brazilian beauty secrets you’d like to share with us? 

I love a good tan and a glow. Living in the U.S., it’s hard to always be tanned. I lose my tan so easily, especially during the winter. And a good trick is a really good scrub. I love the one from Ouai. It’s amazing—it gives you such a good scrub. And then I'll do the self-tanner from Elle Ferguson. It’s from Australia, and it gives you a really nice natural color. So that gives me a hint of color and then I always apply a glow. I feel like every girl should own a body glow. There are many out there, but some are more oily than others. That’s my trick to look good in photos, especially legs and body. To just make your body look good. 

Can you tell us more about tonight's look? 

So the look for tonight, I’m actually really happy about it. Because when I watched the last show, Spring 2020, I was so in love with this look. It opened the show and has all this chiffon, which was so present in the collection. And the ombrés as well, in shades of pink and coral, I was obsessed, and the model was so beautiful too with her hair. I got inspired by the look on my glam as well—I loved her hair, the bouncy wave. So I’m so happy to be wearing it because it was my favorite look from the show. It’s very much my style. Very feminine, and I love it. The colors of the season, too. 

You have over eight million followers on Instagram. What do you think is the most empowering aspect of being an influencer? 
I feel the bigger you are, the more responsibility you have to inspire and impact people in a positive way. Especially today in 2020 we have this responsibility to talk about things that are not strictly fashion or beauty-related. It’s important to teach something. And with me, I started teaching people how to do their makeup and how to style themselves and gave them fashion tips. But it’s important to share the [less polished] aspects of our lives, what we go through. With such a big audience, you’re helping someone by opening up about your insecurities, or bad times in your life. We all have bad days, and I always talk to my followers about that. And that our lives may seem perfect but the grass is always greener on the other side, right? Everyone has their own struggles and that’s normal, so I think it’s definitely a huge responsibility that [those of us with large social media followings] have.
 

You just shared with your followers that you have been struggling with epilepsy since the age of 9. What inspired you to share this, and why talk about it now? 

It’s been a very emotional day for me. And a very important day. I’ve kept this to myself since I was nine years old, when I was diagnosed. I decided to share this now because I felt like I could use my platform to impact people in a different way. And I really believe that’s it’s not just helping myself, because I needed to talk about it, I feel like there’s so much weight off my shoulders now that I’m able to even talk about it without getting so emotional as I did before. I really believe that I will be able to help those who have been through the same journey as I did. Because we are more than 65 million people in the world, and you barely hear anyone talking about it. We have this stigma and this shame sometimes, because we’re scared of what people are going to think. Maybe some people will think we're crazy or that something is wrong with our brains, but most of us live a normal life. And I wanted to show people that you can be whoever you want to be and you don’t need to hide who you are. You can do whatever you want to do; it doesn’t matter what struggles or health issues you’re going through. If you believe in yourself and have faith, nothing should stop you from pursuing your dreams. I’ve received so many positive messages from people who struggle with epilepsy, and getting to hear their stories as well is so inspiring. It’s helping me out and I feel like I’m doing the right thing. 
 

How has the public’s reaction been? 

100% positive so far. When the first article came out, I started receiving messages mostly from people who didn’t follow me. And they just felt touched. The messages were mostly the same. Like, “I feel like I can talk about it now," and “I can talk about it to my friends and it will be okay because you are sharing it." There [are just not many people] that have really talked about it before, so the feedback has been incredibly positive. From my followers as well, the amount of support that I’m getting. Especially now, it’s a very hard time for me because I want to get pregnant and it’s a big decision I need to make, whether I’m getting pregnant with or without medicine. I’m getting a lot of support and I’m sure I’m getting a lot of prayers as well, so I’m really happy with [all the love]. 

What do you think is the biggest misconception about epilepsy? 

When I was younger, I was scared that people would find out about my condition because I thought people would think I was crazy. I think a big misconception is that people think you’re not 100% mentally there, that you don’t process things the right way. There are different kinds of epilepsy and degrees, but most of us who have epilepsy take medicine to control the seizures but live a normal life. Of course, there are people who take the medicine and still have seizures because they have a stronger epilepsy level, but I think that’s the misconception. People think that everyone that has epilepsy kind of is on the same thing, but there are different kinds of epilepsy.

What advice would you give to women who are struggling with epilepsy? 

My advice would be to talk about it. Be open. Don’t be scared, don’t feel insecure. Don’t feel different about yourself because of that. Everyone has struggles; everyone has their own things that they go through. So the more you talk about it, the more normal and included you’re going to feel. And if people look at you differently, that means they don’t belong in your life, and they don’t deserve to be in your life. Be open with your family and friends. That will give you more comfort in the end.