We all know and adore Salama Mohamed. We’re obsessed with her hilarious skits and her warm, loving vibe. That’s not all we love her for—she is the heart and soul behind an incredible skincare brand.
We’ve seen her bright smile lighting up our feeds for what feels like forever, but she recently spilt the tea in a podcast that her journey wasn’t always filled with sunshine and rainbows. Her success story? It’s way more complicated and inspiring than it looks.
We’re here to break down how she became this incredible business woman despite her not-so-glamorous upbringing.
Salama Mohamed: Her struggles with vitiligo
Salama Mohamed opened up about facing bullying and feeling like she didn’t fit the beauty standards. She talked about how having vitiligo from a young age made people treat her differently. “I got vitiligo when I was 5 years old. People wouldn’t even shake my hand because they were scared I’d infect them,” she told Hikmat Wehbi on his podcast.
“I was always outside the box, so I was forced to learn how to love and accept myself,” she shared on his podcast. She mentioned that she had to change how she thought about herself. “You have one skin tone whereas I have two. I must be special in some way,” she told him.
She embraces her appearance with vitiligo, expressing, “I can’t imagine my appearance without vitiligo. I love it,” she told Hikmat Wehbi. She acknowledges that reaching this acceptance wasn’t easy, requiring therapy throughout most of her adult life.
Looking back on her achievements, Salama recalled being the first woman with vitiligo to star in a Christian Louboutin campaign. She got real about the moment, saying, “I kept crying when I saw the picture,” she said in the same podcast. It meant everything to her and marked a huge milestone.
Salama Mohamed: Her challenging childhood
Salama Mohamed reflected on her journey, where her social media skits, though hilarious, stemmed from a place of deep pain.
She explained on the podcast, “My life wasn’t easy; I used humour to make it less painful.” When asked about happy moments from her childhood, she told Hikmat Wehbi, “None. I can’t remember any good moment.” She revealed to him, “I never had one day where I didn’t go through one kind or all kinds of abuse. It was really bad, but it made me who I am today.”
Reflecting on how she coped and who supported her, she shared on the same podcast, “I had no one. I have no idea how I made it out of that life.”
Determined to rewrite her story, she asserted on the podcast, “My life story will be how I want it to be.” Despite the hardships, she acknowledged on the same podcast, “I’ve done years of therapy, and I wouldn’t have it any other way because it made me who I am—an excellent mother, an excellent friend, an excellent sister, and an excellent human being.”
Salama emphasized her commitment to personal growth, saying on the podcast, “And that’s what was lacking in my childhood—those people refusing to just work on themselves” She criticized how previous generations carried trauma without addressing it: “They carried so much trauma from the generation before them, and they didn’t know any better.”
She saw herself as a “generational cycle breaker,” focusing on her mental health and striving to end the cycle of trauma in her family.
Salama Mohamed: Starting her brand
Salama launched Peacefull in 2021, driven by her journey with skin acceptance and love. “My whole journey took me back to my skin,” she shared on a podcast with Sheen Gurrib.
She saw it as completing a full circle—from not accepting her skin to embracing it on a “peaceful” journey.
With Peacefull, Salama aimed to shake up the beauty industry. Rather than reinventing products, she sought to approach them differently, challenging beauty standards and promoting inclusivity.
She said it’s “from people to people,” emphasizing being approachable and listening to people’s needs. She told Sheen Gurrib, “My whole life in social media was me learning about people and what they wanna do, and creating the product for them.”
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