Hey /r/seduction,

As you may have guessed from the title, I am fighting a form of cancer that is very rare, aggressive, and causes "severe appearance deficits." The medical term is actually "disfigurements," which I left out of the title in consideration for those who might not be able to handle that kind of thing. I'm going to be okay, but my skin will pretty much always look different (but not necessarily gross or anything - just discolored and/or hyper-pigmented and/or dry...) and kind of "angry," so to speak. It's chronic (not going to go away), and though my skin has been steadily improving of late, it still looks like I have a giant black eye all the time. I'm using a lot of very nice skincare products to lighten things up near my eyes, keep everything clean and moisturized - all that good stuff that a lot of us would find to be a huge pain in the ass and kind of girly. My skin color often changes wildly with radiation treatments and all that stuff - most of which are, in layman's terms, a mashup of a man-sized microwave, a tanning bed, and a science-fiction death-ray. (For this last reason, makeup isn't really a practical or viable option).

As I start to feel better, I've become more interested in women, romance, and that sort of thing. It honestly hasn't really been a priority for me for a long time, between my serious illness, school, and work, and my immune system was all fucked up so meeting lots of strangers, sex, and a lot of the things we like to do on this subreddit were bad ideas. However, I plan on returning to New York in September (I'll have been away for 18 months), and subsequently back to LA (about a year from then), and would definitely be interested in meeting some new people. In fact, I'm almost guaranteed to, given my lifestyle and work. In both cases, but especially NY, almost nobody knows that I'm sick (let alone just how seriously), and people I already know will probably be surprised with changes in appearance.

I'm really looking for ways to deal with my new look and how to play off people's (especially women's) reactions to it. For example, I get "what happened to your eye?" a lot. I'm a very honest person, but am not sure what's best to say to a stranger or new acquaintance about this issue. I know it's not supposed to matter, I'm not a bad looking guy - I'd definitely say above average - especially without the cancer all over me. I'm not in such bad shape, even after a lot of sometimes-rough treatments (I got rhabdomyolysis for a bit and had to discontinue pretty much all physical activity worth anything for a time), and am trying to work on it (but very safely), which even with a concerted effort is slow going given my new meds, which are basically just poison. Also, I can seem intimidating or even threatening to a fair number of people, and now that I am a lot more tough and look a lot more tough, I like to embrace it.

I'd really appreciate any thoughts you guys might have to offer. I have some time to prepare, if people think I should really go in one direction or another (either more or less intimidating, more sharply or comfortably dressed... whatever the recommendation may be.) I'd like to come up with a plan.