Let’s proudly allow our photos to be taken! Let’s make sure that our memories are documented for future generations. We owe it to our girls. Because it isn’t about the photo really, it’s about self- esteem. Let’s teach them that once you get to a certain age you most certainly should not become invisible. We are interesting, we carry experiences, and we don’t give a sh@t. We are visible because we deserve to be. Let’s stop accidentally teaching our girls to be self-conscious and that if they cannot achieve perfection, they should hideaway. No one puts us in a corner! As a sober woman it’s even more important to me that I am seen. When I was drinking, I cringed when photographs surfaced of nights out. I would frantically search Facebook de- tagging any photographs of me where I looked drunk. I hated having physical proof that I had been over served. We worried that if we weren’t perfect, we weren’t good enough. This isn’t unusual, and it’s even worse now with Instagram, filters and photoshop. I feel very sorry for the younger generation with all this pressure. I worry that I have passed on my owns insecurities about my looks to my daughter and this makes me so sad. I was brought up in a family where there was a lot of focus on what I looked like. I was constantly told how lucky I was that my hair was naturally so blonde and that we were naturally thin. My father was insistent that my sister and I always have a sporting hobby, the reason being that his sisters were all very overweight. He drummed it into us that we did not want to become like this. For my sister and I this was a big worry.
I lost my Mam when I was 17, but I derive great pleasure from looking back at photographs of us together. She died when she was 43, so she never got old. Imagine that she had taken the attitude that I had taken? I would have no photographic memories of her and that would have been devastating to me. Why do we hide from the camera as we get older? What have we really got to hide? I look back now on photographs of teenage me, where I thought I was fat and ugly, and I really wasn’t. I would love to look like that now! I’ve heard people say that they would love to tell their teenage selves that they are beautiful and for teenage them to believe it. Will we be saying that about how we look now in ten years’ time? Why should we wait? Let’s say it now, we are beautiful, but more than that, we are wonderful, accomplished women, and our looks are just one ounce of who we are.
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