This Is What It’s Like To Grow Up ‘Unattractive’ and Glow Up Hot

“I’m pretty sure it’s against community guidelines to be this handsome,” reads a cheeky comment on one of Will Chao’s TikTok posts. The video flashes an awkward photo of him in 2010, right before revealing a picture of his buff bod today. It’s his entry to the #pubertychallenge, a trend on the platform that has people showing off their makeovers. 

Videos with the hashtag now have a total of 21.1 million views, while a similar trend called #glowupchallenge has about 2.9 billion. Both these challenges have users sharing pictures of their awkward teen years, followed by more recent pictures in which they look more conventionally attractive.

Chao, a 28-year-old physiotherapist based in Taiwan, has over 400,000 followers on TikTok. He’s now known for his cosplay content but said that getting there—looking good and being confident—is “not as easy as it seems.”

“It’s over the course of years that you learn these things slowly, and then you have this glow up. People don’t see the process in between the photos,” he told VICE. 

Before going back to Taiwan, Chao lived in the United States, where he moved at 16 years old. He said he didn’t feel attractive growing up because he was bullied for his looks and got rejected by girls he liked. He eventually got tired of that rejection and bullying, and decided to work on his “personal growth.” That involved changing how he dressed, learning how to style his hair, going to the gym, and improving his piano skills. He said all that made him feel more confident, attractive. But he also said that it’s not just about appearances. 

“In reality, a glow up is also about your mental strength,” he explained. He said that in the years since he was bullied in school, he has learned not to let negative comments affect him. 

At first glance, the #pubertychallenge may look like a cry for external validation or a sort of “fuck you” to former bullies, but those who have posted their own videos say it’s more than that. 

Chao said he posted his video with the simple intention of showing how much a person can change, but after the video went viral, he found himself replying to comments and answering questions to share advice and motivate others to make positive changes in their lives.

“I didn’t go into the challenge with such a noble intention,” Chao admitted. “But it was nice that I could reassure some people.”

Aneira Khansa Anindya, a 19-year-old from Jakarta, Indonesia, told VICE that she, too, had a hard time in school because of how she looked. She recalled a time her classmates told her that her opinions didn’t matter because of her appearance. At the time, she had frequent acne breakouts, bad posture, and kept her head down around other people.

“I got laughed at and shamed, to the point that I forced myself to stay in the school’s bathroom every morning just to avoid people,” she said. “I felt ugly because everyone around me mocked my appearance a lot.”

She saw high school as a fresh start. Anindya decided to come out of her shell, treating her skin, studying more, and socializing. “You cannot just find confidence, you build it,” she said. 

“It was hard, of course, [considering] that I was bullied by a lot of people before,” Anindya admitted. But she said she eventually grew into herself when she started surrounding herself with the right people. 

“The key to my [transformation] was finding the right people to interact with,” she said. “When I [put] myself around nice, non-judgmental people, I finally felt at ease.”

Kelson Perez, 24, from Pietermaritzburg, South Africa, also remembers being bullied a lot in school for his dark skin, crooked teeth, and skinny body. 

Perez believes that when it comes to self-improvement, there are things that are under one’s control, and others that are not. He said focusing on those he can improve on, for his own benefit, was the key to his transformation.

“The ones that you can work on, if you want to, by all means you should,” he told VICE. “It’s going to help you in the end.”

Perez said that finally getting his dream body by working out helped with his self-esteem, but added that it’s not just about the final result. 

“Glowing up is directly proportional to progress,” he said, explaining that it’s a continuous process.

He used to see himself as “valueless and lost,” but working on things like his fitness and attitude made him feel more disciplined and confident. 

Glowing up, however, isn’t always about change. Others who posted their own #pubertychallenge videos said that it’s also about acceptance.

“[Glowing up is about] seeing how amazing you are and that you are beautiful as you are,” said 37-year-old Sarah Taylor from Toronto, Canada. 

She was always “the big girl,” Taylor told VICE, and she was bullied for this throughout her time in school. 

“I had absolutely no confidence, and all the hateful things people ridiculed me about became my truth. [I thought] I was fat, ugly, not good enough,” Taylor recalled. 

“[But my transformation] had nothing to do with my weight, which was what I assumed it would be about all my life,” she added. “Rather, [it was about] finally seeing my worth. I think we truly glow up when we can see how valuable and worthy we are of actually living the lives we want.”

For 21-year-old Ale Colmenares from Santiago, Chile, glowing up is about attitude. 

Colmenares said he was bullied in school for things like his unibrow, big nose, and for being too tall. 

“I remember, in high school, I was talking to my teacher and two girls joined the conversation… and talked about me being ugly,” he told VICE. He said the teacher then told the girls that when he grows up, he would be beautiful and that they would fall in love with him. 

“Well, I am beautiful,” Colmenares said, laughing. “But also gay.” 

Nowadays, he thinks that glowing up is about accepting the things that make him unique.

Bibil Rahmawati, 27, from Jakarta, thinks it’s pointless to dwell on insecurities.

“Everyone has their own insecurities. Maybe they feel ugly or they feel less attractive than others,” she told VICE. “I do have it, too, a lot. But will it make me rich if I think about it?”

Her tip? “Instead of trying to make people see us [as] pretty, try to see that we are already pretty.”

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Correction: A previous version of the article said Sarah Taylor was 27 years old, rather than 37 years old. We regret the error.