I think i’ve always had a pretty good sense of perspective. But in recent years i’ve really made it a habit to mentally keep a gratitude journal. Sometimes when I really need to reflect on things I write it down in a real journal.  I’ve always been one to struggle with sadness when I think of other people’s problems and worries, the terrible things that go on in this world. But like a counsellor said to me ‘You can’t save the world, but you can do your part’. I’ve had to learn to try to detach myself from things beyond my control. For a very long time I couldn’t watch the news as i’d just get so upset and not be able to stop crying. Some unkind people called me an ’emotional wreck’, but my loved ones say i’m ‘sensitive’.

This week i’ve really had to have words with myself. One night I was looking in the mirror and upset with my reflection. Not just my body and the excessive weight i’m now carrying and how I barely recognise myself anymore, but also my face.

It’s strange because two things that really bug me I didn’t notice until my late 20s. When I was 26 I noticed that when  I smile there is a prominent crease under my left eye. I’d never noticed it before. I went and looked through all of my childhood photos, and realised it had always been there. I think prior to this I was so obsessed with my protruding ears (otoplasty is something i’m to this day considering)… and the scar on my forehead from a childhood accident.

But this eye thing, it really started to upset me. I found myself smiling less. Once again avoiding having my photo taken. I looked for any remedy to rectify it without surgery (as I am terrified of surgery, even a friend of mine had invasive life saving surgery recently and I was so anxious).

More recently, at 29, not long before my 30th birthday I noticed I had a line under my bottom lip. A horizontal line between my chin and my lip. I knew it was there, but it never bothered me until I realised nobody I knew had one, and no (dare I say it) celebrities I knew of had one. I spent ages googling image searching famous females, from Gemma Arterton to Winona Ryder. None of these gorgeous women had what I later found out is referred to as a ‘labiomental crease’. Oh yes, I found out the name last night and went on many forums. I made the mistake of looking at solutions to ‘fix’ this ‘flaw’. Hoping there’d be a non surgical filler or something, and to my horror, an image came up of the surgery to fix this imperfection. I can’t unseen it. It made me feel nauseated. Considering two of my favourite TV shows were Nip/Tuck and Six Feet Under, it’s strange just how squeamish I am. But this photo is where they go between your gum and your lip and cut open the tissue. I’ll stop here as i’m reliving seeing this awful image. Just the combination of metal surgical equipment, teeth and tissue. I can’t handle it.

 

Then I sort of had an epiphany. When I was later brushing my teeth and focusing on this ‘hideous’ facial feature…

I’m grateful. I am so beyond grateful to have the eye sight to be able to see it.

I am so beyond grateful that I am not going through reconstructive surgery following a terrible accident.

I am grateful that I didn’t even notice it as a ‘problem’ until now, and it was only because I noticed nobody else I knew of seemed to have it. (I even looked at photos of my own friends, and admired the way their chin seamlessly met their lips). Now, I feel a little silly.

I am not a shallow person. In fact, I find shallowness such a turn off. I’ve grown up with very shallow people in my family. A younger family member who said ‘I wish I had eyes your colour Stace’…..I would have replied something along the lines of ‘Don’t wish to have anyone elses eye colour. Your green eyes are lovely’.   But the eldest family member in the room, the one believed to have the most wisdom and maturity said ….’No! Blue eyes are the best colour. Blue eyes are much better’. He himself had blue eyes. He was not kidding. It was in a restaurant at dinner. He was very serious, to the point of being moody and seemingly even a little offended that we were so ‘stupid’ to not realise that ‘Blue eyes are the best eye colour’. (I won’t make a Hitler joke here, I know the internet is very PC). The guy was 30 years my senior and talking in front of me who has hazel eyes and young teenager who has green eyes. I’m not sure if I was disappointed, baffled, amused or disgusted. Modesty eh?

That’s just one example of the shallow BS i’ve endured growing up. So, when I get so focused on my appearance I get mad at myself. I don’t want to be this person who bases my self worth on how I look, it’s something i’ve done all of my life. I’ve had a major feeling of inferiority to other girls, and later women as I approached adulthood.

I don’t judge other people by their looks, so why do I judge myself so harshly?

Do I really want to spend thousands of pounds and realistically get in debt to fix this little horizontal line and go through the anxiety and pain of the surgery?  Unnecessary surgery as I now view it regarding myself. I want to say here that I completely understand people who opt for surgery to make themselves happy, and I respect that. As long as they are doing it for themselves and the issue isn’t deeper than their appearance. I am not judging people. I’m just reflecting on myself here.

I decided I’m going to accept it. Hey, I guess it make me unique? I’m going to stop wondering if the guys who told me I was pretty thought ‘she’d look better without that on her face.’.  Because quite honestly, a guy who thinks like that is so unattractive to me. I like dudes who really value a beautiful heart over a beautiful face.

I’d be lying if I said looks don’t come into the equation. I’ve only dated (well, dated isn’t the right word. Had what I believed to be a whirl wind romance) with one guy I wasn’t physically attracted to. He wasn’t unattractive, he just wasn’t my ‘type’. But i’d be a hypocrite to say I don’t notice a ‘good looking’ guy. Equally though, i’ve fancied so many guys because of their awesome personality and when other people have said shallow things like ‘they’re not even hot’, i’m bemused as I find the guy so incredibly hot.

 

Looks fade man. Integrity, wit and kindness? That’s part of somebody’s being for life.

Is Jake Gyllenhaal the cutest guy ever? Admittedly so. (in my opinion). He’s a bit of a dreamboat. Let’s be honest. But hey, maybe he’s a douchebag?  An incredibly gorgeous and talented douchebag. Then again, maybe he’s lovely? A little pretentious (I’ve seen a few interviews where I cringed so hard), but maybe he’s just a lovely person. Would I like to work with him one day? Of course, I’d love to work with so many talented actors. Aim high right?  Some of the most talented actors in my opinion aren’t really that famous.

I’ve known guys who are literally beautiful on the outside, I’ve worked with many of these type of guys… but that ‘crush’ lasted all of ten minutes, they turned out to be utter assholes. Shallow, lame and not exactly kind. I once had a teacher at uni and he was as we all said ‘fit’, but he wasn’t nice at all. He was obnoxious and mean, yet other girls seemed to look past this and go on about him and flirt with him. I was more of the opinion ‘the guys a jerk. Nice face, but awful personality’.  Even though one of my friends thought he wasn’t nice, she still continued to obsess over him. (this was actually the point where I ended that friendship. The jerk teacher said something that really wasn’t ok about me being at hospital with a loved one and missing class as my family member was dying. The friend told me about this, and said it was nasty, but continued to be so painfully obvious in trying to be liked by this guy). I’m pretty proud that I got so many A’s and barely attended his classes. It must have pained him to give me those A’s.

One day i’ll master the skill of writing a blog post and not going off on a tangent writing an essay of randomness. I’ll wrap this up and just say, there’s always something to be grateful of. A few things i’ll list below are things i’ve reminded myself of the positive. Don’t get me wrong, there are times when I see no positive, I try hard and fail to see a positive. When my mum was in intensive care following the stroke and we were told she may not make it, I just didn’t want to be in the world anymore. If I felt my stepdad didn’t need me, I truthfully don’t think i’d be here today writing this. I need to thank my best friend for supporting me at this time. I learnt why there’s a term such a ‘best friend’ during that time. To me it means family.

 

So here goes….

 

• Feeling upset that my boyfriend and I may decide to break up. It’s not been great for a while now and we talk openly about ‘moving on’. The Positive?  He is an amazing human and I feel privileged that we will regard each other as family the rest of our lives. I am so beyond fortunate to have met another person I completely trust and who I know values my happiness. He’s selfless and funny, and to have him in my life at all is a blessing. Maybe we won’t grow old together as a married couple, but we’ll definitely still be making each other laugh when we’re elderly. (If of course we’re both fortunate enough to live that long. Remember growing older is a blessing).

 

 

• Growing Older.  Yeah, I have over 5 grey hairs on my head now. Dozens of wrinkles on my forehead when I lift my eyebrows. I’m finding it harder to lose weight than I used to. The Positive?  I’m fortunate to have grown older. Growing older is a privilege denied to too many people, and it’s heartbreaking. So even though I have my struggles, and sometimes I’m really feeling low in life, growing older is not something I choose to focus on in a negative light.

 

• This is a really big one. It’s heartbreaking. And maybe a little sensitive to include in this list, but i’m telling my truth. A family member of mine has been told she had a brain tumour. It’s large and of course terrifying. She may also now have a blood clot too. But, I was so beyond relieved to find out it wasn’t cancerous. Of course it’s still awful, but the positive? believe it there is some positivity here. She has a big loving family supporting her (Some people have nobody), she’s seeing the best surgeons out there, and it’s not cancerous. I have to say I don’t know where she gets her bravery and strength. Unimaginable how scary it must be.

 

• My mum survived the stroke. She now has aphasia which means we can no longer talk how we used to, some days she suffers double vision. Her right arm was left paralysed (although she’s finally getting a little movement back so after all I guess it’s not paralysed). Again, she has a lot of love and support and for that i’m truly grateful. She is still here with us, we laugh a lot, it’s a struggle but there’s so much to be thankful for.

 

• May seem a little trivial, but exercise. Exercise is ace, and seeing how my mum worked so hard to learn to walk again, the ability to exercise is a privilege. I sometimes feel so down about just how hard i’m going to have to work out to get my ‘old figure back’. But the fact I can do it, is a blessing. I have a cousin who is on medication that is making her gain so much weight, it’s really getting her down, and she’s only in her twenties and is now in a wheelchair and needs a stair lift. If I find myself moaning about needing to do intense workouts to get a healthier body, I quickly stop myself!

 

• Having to fill out loads of paperwork. My mum is learning to write her name (by copying the letters where I have written it for her), with her left hand. She struggles but has made so much progress. A simple thing like being able to write at all, let alone the ability to write with the hand you grew up writing with is a blessing. I remind myself of this every time my hand is aching from having to write so much work.

 

• Like I said before, my eyesight. My eyesight when I look in the mirror and obsess over flaws. I’m grateful to have my eyesight. When a song I cannot stand comes on the radio and i’m not allowed to change the station, I have my hearing. I have the ability to hear this awfulness I am hesitant to call music as it offends my ears.

 

Some of these things are a lot more serious than others. I’m not trying to put more trivial issues on the same level as the more worrying issues. I just want to point out from little things, to issues of much higher severity, make gratitude your attitude. By all means deeply feel emotions, cry, admit you are struggling. You may feel lost, alone, scared. But try, as difficult as it seems, to see something to be grateful for. If you’re in hospital are you fortunate enough to have loved ones who visit you? Some people may be completely alone. It’s something I always think about whenever i’m in a hospital. I find it difficult to go into hospitals as my anxiety makes it hard, but also emotionally if I see people suffering, or their loved ones crying, or even worse, I hear that someone has no visitors… I can’t detach myself from it. Even if I were to go and talk to them i’d wonder if I was the only person they’d have to talk to. It breaks my heart.

If you’re an emotional person like me, and you struggle with depression, anxiety, OCD… Just try to keep a gratitude journal for a while. It’s really helped me.

I used to feel I wasn’t allowed to feel upset as there was always somebody ‘worse off’, even since I was a child. I’ve always felt guilty feeling emotions. But i’m not saying to ignore those emotions. That’s not healthy. Allow yourself to cry, to feel sad, to feel angry…. but at the same time just try to realise the blessings too.

 

Take Care guys,

 

Stace x