Girlhood is the collection of late nights turned early mornings spent conversing. It’s health ed classes that make you dizzy with discomfort. It’s outgrowing your favourite dress and not quite knowing what to replace it with, and it’s choosing who to embody each day because you have no solid grip on your own identity.
Despite all of the confusing and challenging parts of girlhood, it’s a pivotal part of growing up. Girlhood is a time of stability, where you’re protected by a veil of innocence and blissfully unaware of the coldness of the outside world.
Yet, slowly but surely or all at once, our girlhood leaves us behind. We learn to despise the colour pink and all things floral. We learn to tone down our personalities as we realize how much space we take up in the room.
It’s time to start embracing girlhood by nurturing our inner child and letting go of the societal judgement telling us to down down our brightness, barely leaving a trace of ourselves behind.
When, if ever, do we lose our girlhood?
Perhaps you lost your girlhood the first time you felt like showing emotions was childish. You realize the same tears that used to bring you support and comfort are now being met with cold shoulders and annoyance. Perhaps you lost your girlhood the first time someone made a comment about your appearance, shattering the illusion that all people see you with kind eyes.
In “Would’ve Should’ve Could’ve” on Taylor Swift’s new (phenomenal) album Midnights, Taylor belts, “give me back my girlhood it was mine first.” This line encapsulates a moment every girl will experience; the moment you feel your youth slipping, or even worse, stolen.
Protecting our girlhood.
Despite the countless times we’ve been told to hide or tone down our girlhood, there’s a part of us that will always hold the same hopes and dreams of the little girl inside of us.
So, how do we get our girlhood back?
Firstly, we need to start supporting the women around us instead of joining in on this bandwagon of judgement. Not only should we let people dress how they want, act how they want, and like what they want; we should encourage women to let their personalities be known.
Secondly, we need to figure out who we are outside of the person we have created to please the outside world. We cannot reclaim our girlhood until we understand what our own girlhood is. Who did you admire when you were younger? Who were your favourite singers? What did you do in your free time, and what did you think about before you fell asleep? Step into the past and try to understand the younger version of yourself, and let go of the judgement and criticism you have placed upon this version of you. We may find we are holding deep-rooted ideas of ourselves based on the tiny bits of criticism we have been internalizing.
Lastly, girlhood requires us to stick our necks out for the women in our lives, especially women who are robbed of their girlhood. As I was writing this article, I encountered a survey that found:
“Compared to white girls of the same age, survey participants perceive that
- Black girls need less nurturing
- Black girls need less protection
- Black girls need to be supported less
- Black girls need to be comforted less
- Black girls are more independent
- Black girls know more about adult topics
- Black girls know more about sex“
Thus, not only do we all need to nurture our own girlhood, but we have to ensure every single little girl gets to experience it. That girls everywhere are allowed to live as someone who believes in fairytales and are protected from monsters under beds. Girlhood is a pivotal part of every woman’s life, and we need to nurture our girlhood both in childhood and into adolescence.
The survey ended as follows:
Innocence is a privilege that all women should get to experience. We need to empower the new generation of little girls around us, ensuring they are not only unashamed of their girlhood, but able to relish in this magic for as long as they want.
Girlhood Forever
There will come moments and people who will attempt to take pieces of our girlhood from us, yet I’m on a mission to protect my girlhood—and I believe I’ve done a pretty good job so far.
Girlhood for me is wishing on stars for as long as I can remember. It’s the time a girl I met in first year gave me a stick and poke of a shooting star on my ankle on her dorm room floor. It’s the fact that another new friend, who is now my roommate, told me she had wished on a star for my happiness. And it’s the fact that these two girls are people I still hold close to my heart.
Girlhood, as wildly confusing and challenging as it is, is an enchanted time where everything twinkles with innocence. Not only can we work to repaint our worlds with girlhood, but to protect and nurture the girls in our lives who were robbed of theirs from the start.