to my 16-year old self
love, laura delarato
Hi friends,
Welcome to my new series: “Letters to Our Past Selves.” I’m so honoured to begin this series with a letter written by Laura Delarato - author, body image advocate, and sexual wellness educator.
This letter is in dedication to her sixteen year old self, and contains reflections on body image, hope, and unconditional love.
To my dearest sixteen year old self,
I'm writing to you from my studio apartment that you painstakingly rent for way more money than you ever imagined for a living expense. A sage green light is seen from your window signifying someone home and enjoying it. Your bathroom is filled with every skin care remedy on the market so our acne won't come back — yeah, it goes away. Your dog is laying on the bed curled in eucalyptus scented sheets, and Lana Del Rey's smoky sad songs are blaring through YOUR space. You thought Michelle Branch spoke to you? Lana's albums are now anthems.
To sum up: You made this future for me. For us? I don't know how parallel dimensions work, but I just need you to know that who you are is the reason I am here in this nice-ass apartment, drinking a Coke without permission, petting a silly little dog that you are confidently and successfully raising. Not to be so completely tender at this moment (gross) but like . . . you believed in us. Thank you, you little weirdo. I know it took everything.
I hate to break it to you, Laura, but we weren't told of our natural witch tendencies by our two esoteric aunts and a talking black cat. We were never taken under some elegant woman's wing to show us the ropes of fine luxury goods or how to lure a man with some secret charm of sophisticated women. And we never lost the sense that this world felt too much for us sometimes.
I don't remember everything about you, just small details like how you would boil hot water and mix it with green Kool-aid to dye sections of your hair a mossy tone. But I do emphatically remember how you feel right now at 16: starving, aching, shameful, broken, unnoticed, unloved. A hot pink walkman blared our feelings into over ear headphones while we tried to hide the cutting, the plucking, the shaving. We are still not afraid of blood. I rub the scars on my upper arm and the ones at the hinges of our wrist, and pray you can sense me in the atmosphere the way I sense you now here.
Keep going, I tell you.
I am trying for us, I hear back.
There have been scuffs and fear and self-advocacy and deep loneliness and heart-breaking stoicism in the face of incredible losses. In each moment that I just want to press my face to a cool bathroom floor and sob, I hear you in my head. I see you in my thoughts. And in that thought, there is an aquamarine lava lamp on your bedside table (so cool) and No Doubt is unironically playing on the multi disc SONY CD player — the one you got by saving tips from your waitress job.
I tell you, Feel it now not later — and you say, I'm giving it my all.
[Side Note: It just dawned on me why I come home, turn on the sage light setting of my Philips' Hue Lighting system and play 90s music. Sixteen year old Laura . . . you are at the root of my cool.]
My therapist (yes, we have one now and we're realizing we should have always had one all along) asks me from time-to-time to conjure you up in my mind. I see you in bike shorts and an oversized t-shirt borrowed from your grandfather. Your hair is down and drab. Your skin is picked and angry. But there is a light somewhere in your eyes — and your brain is somewhere else deciphering how you will break free from feeling so . . . I don’t know . . . unworthy. I know you feel too ugly, too big, too much to ever consider a future where we would enjoy smiling . . . or even posing in pictures (it becomes a big part of our personality that we sometimes debate is mentally healthy). And yet, I'm here praying that the wind or sign or a dream brings you this message from the future where Britney is still in pop culture but :::so.much.has.happened:::.
You are introspective . . . intuitive, rather. You're always looking deep into the dark corners of every room to prove that there was something, anything, beyond this realm. The 2018 film "Hereditary" will strengthen your curiosities but affirm what you already know: ghosts exist. You read books about magick with a mystical k and hold back her tears when the world was cruel to you. And it is. It really is. Especially right now in, I think, 2004. Magnified compact mirrors and needle-point tweezers became your release; always plucking and squeezing and hoping that future me (hi) would figure out a solution. And with that hope, another one for our body that you binge and purge and starve.
I don't blame you for that, by the way. I know you feel guilty about it but I really get it. You wear clothes too big for your frame, you don't speak up in class, you don't rock the boat, and in large part try to go unnoticed — even if all you really want is to be noticed . . . it was never in the right way, though. So don't feel bad for what's going on right now.
I hear you in the bathroom: I'm sorry.
I tell you: It's okay. I love you.
I really really do love you. I love you so much. I love your resilience, your ability to feel deeply, to be kind to everyone even if they aren't kind to you back. In your more difficult moments you tend to shut down, raise your guard, become stern and unwavering. But I don't care. I love you. Hear me: I love you. Because you are here with me in the future guiding my moves and I'm there with you in the past keeping you safe . . . or side-by-side universes. I don't know. How does one communicate across time and space? Just know that I love you and I don't blame you and you're doing it all right.
I love you too, Laura.
Substack: Hey Laura
Instagram: @heylauraheyyy
Web Site: lauradelarato.com
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