Yesterday, as I scrolled through old pictures—salivating over the memory of hot cocoa in knee-deep snow, with Mount Rainier close enough to high-five—I tripped onto a photo of myself.
The curtains were drawn. I was posing, deliberately amplifying my feminine assets, surrounded by a mix of people I’d met dealing poker at the casino. Varying ages, varying degrees of familiarity. They were in my house. We were drinking—heavily—and I’m certain it was the wee hours of the night.
I looked closely at myself. My thin, twenty-something frame. My smooth skin is free of deep wrinkles or sunspots. For a moment, I felt pride. I was dang pretty, I thought. But then, the shame hit. Who were those single-serving friends? And why had I chosen to fill my space with them instead of being alone?
Nothing against them—it’s just that I know now how little I valued myself back then, how much I sought connection in places that could never truly offer it. And that’s what stands out most in the picture. Not the people, not even me—but the lack. The emptiness.
The photo feels overdeveloped. The churn in my stomach was immediate, the weight of something unspoken pressing down. Part of me wanted to extend compassion to the girl in the picture, to tell her she was loved and that I understood her now. But that felt impossible. So, instead, I took a different lens to back then.
That was me in chaos. In dysfunction. Without boundaries. I didn’t know how to value myself, so I did what I thought others wanted of me. It led to dead-end roads and a lot of hurt. But I’m not there anymore. Today, I have a great deal of compassion, grace, and care for myself.
I’m not there anymore, and I have a great deal of compassion, grace, and care for myself today. And I don’t have to do anything with that photo other than recognize how far I’ve come. That kind of chaos isn’t even a possibility for me now.
And that’s enough.
Love, Jaclynn
Going On 40 