The secret life of a teenage girl

When you look in the mirror what do you see?

Growing up I saw a big brown doe-eyed girl with thin brown hair and olive skin. I felt pretty like nothing could stop me. I felt pretty because I didn't care how people looked at me, I was happy to skip along the sidewalk without a care in the world not even thinking about if my stomach was sticking out or if my shorts covered my cellulite.

but something changed, it is hard to pinpoint exactly where this change started. If it was the girls laughing in the locker room or the constant backhanded insults coming from my "friends" in middle school, but something switched. No longer was my mirror where I checked how good I looked or check to see if I needed to brush my hair that day my mirror became an all-out war zone.

It started slowly but quickly became all-consuming. When my friends around me started to comment on their thigh gaps and flat stomachs wishing they were smaller I started to realize that my thighs rubbed together when I walked and that I had short legs and a big nose. One thing led to the next thing I hated about myself and the next thing and sure enough, I began to hate everything about myself. Gone were the days of carefree skipping about I was now a self-conscious girl who didn't want to call attention to anything about her.

What was even harder than hating how I looked was trying to hide the fact that I hated how I looked. While other girls started to call attention to the things that they liked about themselves I would simply stand in the back and nod in agreement not having anything to add to the conversation. I would pretend to be confident pretend to feel pretty and sometimes I would think that I was pretty until I saw a picture of myself, or a friend took a video. And the vicious cycle would start again.

IF I COULD JUST

a phrase repeated over and over and over again in my little warzone above my bathroom sink. If I could just have a smaller nose and longer eyelashes and bigger lips and a flat stomach, and smaller arms, and weigh less and have smaller legs.

IF I COULD JUST

not eat so many snacks, go a little longer without food, I would look how I wanted. Like the models on the pages and how my friends looked.

flash forward.... now a girl is almost in her 20 somethings, and I still honestly have not figured it out. I still suck in when I am walking around or think people can see and shift how I am sitting and pull down my shorts terrified my cellulite is showing. And some days, I don't let myself eat, but I have learned a few things along the way.

1. those girls were also so self-conscious we all are in this together so do not pull each other down.

2. you are beautiful in your own way no one looks like those models

3. do not let other people tell you who you are or tell you how you must look

4. do not deny or self-things, a dress you could rock, food, anything for other people

So, when you look in your mirror, know You are worth more than you know, and be unapologetically you go and skip carefree.

And hopefully, you see something new in the mirror.