I Feel Pretty

I have reflected on this very topic in a previous post and I was more philosophical and deep with my answer then. Today, I’m taking the shallow route and saying I think one word that could describe me right now is ‘pretty’. This is, of course, subjective. However, I have been feeling outwardly pretty lately. And I say that now as something to brag about because I have never felt this way. No teenager ever truly thinks they are beautiful, and so I didn’t either. In my 20s, my mental health and my first years as a teacher were my focus. I wasn’t too concerned with how I looked. In my 30s, I was very busy being 110% invested in my job as an educator. Now that I’m in my 40s and have a shiny new outlook on my life, I have taken more time to appreciate my appearance. Well, I’m at least being more attentive to it.

My sister is so proud of the fact that I regularly get my eyebrows waxed. She literally sat on me when I was in high school so she could tweeze them. I also use product in my hair now. I have just let my frizzy, 80s curls do their thing up until now. But lately I’ve been putting fancy, anti-frizz, leave in conditioner type products in my hair so the curls are still there, just much more controlled and not as wild. I’ve also lost a good amount of weight since being on Mounjaro. I had to start taking it to control my blood sugar. Stress had shot it up super high. I wouldn’t consider myself thin, but I am thinner than I ever have been. Or, at least since I was in high school.

All of these things are really just things I do to make myself feel as good about my outer appearance as I do about my inner self. Except for the medicine. I do actually need that. But I can’t complain about the weight loss from it.

Like I said, this feeling of liking how I look is very new to me. My husband has told me I’m beautiful for the entire almost 25 years that I’ve known him. I am only just now starting to believe him.