Adolescence: You're Supposed to Be Ugly & Awkward

Puberty was not kind to me.I got my height (5’7”) early. I was taller than most (all?) of the boys in my class until we hit high school. And I was skinny. I mean beanpole. Not a curve or whisper of fat on me anywhere. That may sound dreamy to people who struggle with their weight, but that kind of skinny brings its own problems. They didn’t make pants for 5’7” girls without hips. To get jeans that covered my ankles meant I had two floppy, swaying saddlebags of denim, filled with nothingness where my behind and hips were not.Boobs? Ha. I resonated with Jess Bhamra in Bend It Like Beckham when her aunt referred to hers as mosquito bites. I was told by an older female family member that my shoulder blades stuck out in back farther than my girls did in front.It was true.But I did wonder, as I grew older and entered my middle age, if my memory of that time was harsher than reality warranted. Maybe I wasn’t actually as ugly and awkward as I recalled?Heh. Heh. Heh.A few years ago I reconnected with the mother of my best friend from junior high. Tragically, Penny died an untimely death, and I reached out to her mom after. Sherry sent me some pictures of Penny and me in junior high.When I opened the envelope of photos I dropped them on the counter in horror.Oh yes, it was just as bad as I’d remembered.I had braces. I had acne. I had glasses too, but I took them off for photos in an attempt to improve the one thing that could be easily improved. My hair went bat-poo crazy during puberty too, and my curls became a no-kidding afro. Not exaggerating one little bit. I tried to grow it long, but it just got bigger and wider and more unruly.At the particular school dance in the photo Sherry sent I wore a pink and white floral-print disaster of a prairie-fantasy frock. Its high lace collar further emphasized my scrawniness, as did the belted waistline and puffy Nellie Olson sleeves.I was…...not lovely.I won’t even address the depth of my interpersonal backwardness.Just for a reference point, when a popular high school junior who was the star of the varsity basketball team called to ask me out during my freshman year-- he’d seen me in the school play where someone else costumed me, did my hair, and loaded on my stage makeup, and where every word I said came off a script-- I begged my parents to tell me I wasn’t allowed to date yet. Why? I was frozen-stiff terrified that I’d make an enormous fool of myself (and I probably would have) if left alone with him and expected to maintain conversation.You could not pay me enough to pass through adolescence again.But those few years were a big part of what turned me into the person I am now. I learned empathy for those who feel less-than. I found out that there are more valuable parts to me than my physical attractiveness. I developed resilience in the face of others’ unkindness and often downright meanness. And for all that, I am grateful to have suffered through them.Today, kids in the U.S. live in one of the most beauty-focused cultures that has ever existed. They’re bombarded with photoshopped and curated images of people who don’t actually exist, and they’re told that this is what they’re supposed to look like, and that if they don't there's something wrong with them.We’ve also entered a phase in our national life where being disliked or insulted is considered “actual violence” and if someone turns you down when you ask them to dance they’re branded a bigot or bully. Today’s youth have been coddled into a lack of psychological fortitude at the same time they’re being told that anyone who doesn’t fall in line with their demands (whether it be for Likes or for an A+ on a paper or for the chance to date their crush) is violating their human rights and denying their very personhood.Is it any surprise that the natural identity crises of adolescence have plunged into self-destructive death-spirals?Kids don’t know what’s normal anymore because the people telling them how to get through adolescence are liars:“If you don’t like the way you feel, you have to take something to feel better.”“If you don’t like the way you look, you need to have surgery or you’ll kill yourself.”“If you don’t feel comfortable inside your own skin, it’s because your body is wrong. Anyone who tells you differently is a hater, whatever-phobe, bigot, religious hypocrite.”Here’s the bald-faced truth: adolescence sucks while you’re in it. You’re ugly. You’re awkward. Your body doesn’t fit you anymore because it’s changing faster now than it has since the very first year of your life. Hormones are ravaging you inside and out. You look in the mirror and you don’t even recognize that person. You hear yourself saying things and feel yourself doing things that you don’t even want to say or do, but you can’t seem to help it. You’re out of control.And you know what else? You’re brain-underdeveloped. You really are. The gray matter hasn’t finished unfurling itself yet, and you don’t make good decisions all the time. Maybe a lot of the time.We’re supposed to help you with that-- us, your parents, your teachers, your doctors, your therapists, your aunts and uncles and grandparents. We’ve all been through it, so we should know. We should guide you, encourage you, and redirect you.But we’ve been led astray, deceived, and lied to.Just like you.We haven't done our jobs.Sweet kid who’s going through years twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen-- hold on. Hang on white-knuckled if you have to. Ride these rapids and cling to your raft for all it’s worth. It’ll stop, I promise. You’re going to land in smoother waters sooner than you think.Don’t believe it when people tell you you’re not right, or agree with you when you suggest there’s something wrong with you. That’s a load of lies. You’re in transition and that’s not a good look on anybody. Even the few people who go from being adorable kids to beautiful adults without seeming to pass through the gangly, pimply, awkward stage don’t feel beautiful. I promise. I’ve talked to many of them.Everybody’s faking their way through.I swore I’d never show anybody that photo of me at the dance in that dress when I was twelve. But here I go, about to show you. I want you to see it, because I want you to know that you’re not alone. That there’s truly nothing wrong with you. I want you to see this picture.

Oh, mercy. That was what an awkward twelve-year-old's photo looked like before digital cameras and Photoshop and Snapchat filters.Now I want you to look at the one below, my business headshot. I paid $250 for a talented photographer to take it in her studio, with professional cameras and lights, and clothes and jewelry I borrowed from her set. She spruced up the final product with Photoshop as well.

I will never again look as awful as I did during junior high (fingers crossed, anyway), and the real me will never look as good as I do in the photo I had created.That’s just reality.Please stop hating yourself. What you’re going through is so normal, and it’s exactly what every one of us has gone through.You’re going to be fine.No. You're already fine.