“Life takes you unexpected places, love brings you home.”

 


Dear Ladies of the Gen Z gen,

Although the accessibility and influence of social media was not an issue for us of the Gen X/Elder Millennial generation, we do, in fact, know a little something about growing up with warped views on what was expected of us as far as looks went. Please see the “heroin chic” and “nothing tastes as good as skinny feels” aesthetic of the late 90’s and early 2000’s if you need a point of reference. As someone who fell victim to the Victoria secret of it all, and was so dedicated that I starved myself for most of my twenties, I know how you feel. But I have to say, I am continuously shocked (although at this point I shouldn’t be) at the new ways we come up with to torture ourselves into fitting the beauty mold. Botox, fillers, lifts and surgery are no longer reserved for the rich and middle-aged; it’s walking the hallways of the college I work at. It’s showing up on the faces and bodies of girls and women barely out of their teen years, whose brains, by scientific definition, are not yet fully formed. It’s discussed openly, almost as a necessity, much like the diets and starvation techniques were back in “my day”, although I’m tempted to say, in addition to. I vacillate between dismay and horror, because as a 43-year-old, I’m very aware of what happens to the skin and muscles of the human body as middle age creeps up. I shudder to think what could/will happen to skin and muscle that have been pumped full of chemicals and dissolvable fat as the years roll on

It makes me sad to see how much things change but don’t. It devastates me to think about how important I thought these things were when I was their age. How each generation slowly begins to realize how damaging it all was, just as the up-and-coming creates new ways to trick themselves into believing they are not enough.

I feel as though I’ve been lost for a long time now. The past 10 years have been some of the best and worst of my life so far. And for whatever reason, the fog is starting to lift. And I’ve felt called to start writing again, in a way that I thought was gone forever. I think I felt like a part of me was gone, and no matter how badly I wanted, I wasn’t going to be able to get it back. Like I’ve spent so long trying to get back to this version of me that doesn’t, can’t, exist anymore. I could not even entertain the possibility that there might be something better in the works.  I’m old, I’m sorry, “wise” (?) enough to understand that I’m still on shaky ground and need to proceed with care. But as my thoughts are coming out of my fingers in a way that feels comforting and familiar after all these years, I’ll say I’m cautiously optimistic.

I’m kinder than I used to be, softer and stronger at the same time. I feel love in a way I never thought was possible for me. I’ve survived things that I had no clue were coming, never would have dreamed were possible. I’ve become things I would never have believed I could, for better and for worse.

My world looks nothing like the way twenty-something Steph thought it would look. I used to think that was a failure on my part, that I was letting her down. That I WAS a failure because of…reasons. But now I’m starting to look back at her in a different way. She had a lot of things that she did very well. But as I listen to the new twenty-somethings, what they think is important, how they feel about themselves, and how much they still have to learn and grow, I look back at that Steph and I smile. I smile and I think, “Girl. You have. No. Idea. “




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