At an early age, and for as long as she can remember, author Rosina Ramón has had an obsession with fashion and beauty. In her memoir, “Pass Me the Lip Gloss: Surviving the Challenge with Fashion,” she shares her story, narrating how her love of fashion and not looking lousy even on her darkest days helped her get through the Challenge, (her name for cancer).

For more than thirty years, fashion has been Ramón’s sole profession, representing models, coordinating fashion shows, styling photo shoots, and consulting on trends and image. She firmly believes playing with fashion is an important tool one can use as the foundation for a beautiful and attractive inner and outer self.

“Fashion is the most important tool one can use as the foundation for a beautiful and attractive self. We must understand I am not talking only about trends of the moment, as Coco Chanel used to point out: “Fashion passes, and style remains.”  Fashion becomes the elemental tool for nourishing the person we want to be, but most of all having fun in the process. The answer to my predicament was simply in the management of the art of transformation, and at that I had become an expert.”

Ramón shares how she used willpower, her positivity, but most of all her love of fashion to help her beat “the Challenge.” Whether it was colored wigs, funky fashion, or lip gloss, she shifted the focus from being sick to her unique style which crafted a journey with wit to make heads turn in astonishment. She thought: “Now, how do I dress for being sick? Well, I had to analyze first my state of mind every morning, which at the time was one of the loneliest places I had ever visited. My world stopped. I had been forgotten, left without air, drowning in a deep pool unable to stay afloat. Going against the high wave of desperation I seized on to the first thing, which gave me a chance, to grasp at some needed oxygen; beauty and fashion.”

As she faced the physical and mental results of “the Challenge”, she had an epiphany one day looking in the mirror:

“Glancing at my terrified reflection staring back from the mirror, a thought pops like lighting. A simple idea. What if I play with this fear and dress it up a bit, what more do I have to lose?

A pretty dress will surely give me confidence. I will mix it with attitude and add some subtle makeup to cover my drab sick complexion. Providing me with the necessary courage, to cope with the beast lurking around called panic.

From now on my fears will be covered in gold and sequence. Any intruder ready to attack, will have to untangle itself from lace and crochet, spitting feathers from my long red boa. Besides taking a tremendous fall from my high-heel black stiletto boots.”

Rosina Ramón’s book, “Pass Me the Lip Gloss: Surviving the Challenge with Fashion” is available on iBooks, Barnes & Noble, and Amazon.