I was recently visiting family and friends where we used to live and whilst in town I was envying some very glamorous and much more sheened than I was as a teenager/twenty somethings, I asked my best friend if she'd seen them to which she replied that "we've had our time". I felt utterly sad, frumpy and totally past-it. Meantime, sleep-deprived, bereaved, menopausal and shoe-horning myself into clothes, pouring with sweat (the hottest day of the year down there) and that's after a shower, I wasn't exactly feeling it myself. My first thought was "hell no I haven't had my time yet! I'm only just beginning". Why should age put a barrier on fun? Why should only young people be viewed as beautiful? Why must everything be judged on the way we look (as guilty as I am of that). Must I be put out to pasture just because I'm 54?

As a teenager, I really was plug ugly or so I thought. One of my dad's friends used to ask jokingly after "his ugly teenager". You see I thought that after this unfortunate spell, and wanting to be like my second cousin or rather actually be her (look for earlier post on my perfect 2nd cousin), I decided it would be a good idea to put everything into the way I look. Because I also felt I had an awful inside (personality) too. When you have poor self esteem this is what I did. Started to put too much emphasis on the outside. Even started taking selfies for God's sake and putting them up on Facebook when I felt low but fishing for compliments only increases one's sense of poor self worth.

These days I put more into my personality than I do my looks. But I will tell you this. I'm going to "mermaid" my hair, I'm going to cover my thread veins with pretty tattoos and get those legs out which I was always complimented on, I'm going to continue to rebel against the hair brush because I like these wavy locks (I've hung the hair straighteners up for now). My hair I think is telling me what I should do with the rest of myself saying "it's fine, leave me alone for now, put the fingers through it, don't dye the hell out of it as toner is your new friend, wash it once a week and let it do it's thing". I don't think my hair's ever looked better, even though I've only had it cut twice in nearly 3 years of being here (in November). I realise I don't want or need the Kardashian contouring – I've got cheekbones you could cut butter on but you know it's not an idle boast. I've also got unwanted rolls here and there that I'd like to push up and move around but I plan to eat better, drink less alcohol, have more water and tone up.

My point in summation is this... there is never a "time" that people have had. The time is now. To be fitter, stronger, less concerned with what others think, to be beautiful your own way inside and out.

Liz

A Moodscope member.