She Loves Me: Reflections of a 20 Something and Advice for Women at the Glorious Age of 19

lol screengrab from my reflection video bc idk what other image to put, 2023

This morning I woke up to a facebook notification telling me to check out a memory from 4 years ago. 4 years ago seems so distant, but that was just 2019.

I ignored the notification for a while, saw a this tweet:

And then I figured: it must be the universe telling me to finally sit down and confront my 19 year old self. I logged back onto facebook and decided to check out the memory, and it was a video of a group of activists at ASU demanding that ASU recognize its repressive tactics in silencing leftists and people of color on campus. I was one of those activists!

At the fossil age of 23, I sat down and recorded my thoughts, uploaded them onto a private Youtube, and then sat with that for the rest of the day.

Some highlights:

1. I am so physically, emotionally, and mentally different from my 19 year old self.
2. I am so proud of the fact that for roughly 5 years, I have been fighting for what I am passionate about.
3. Despite the hardship I have went through these past 4 years in particular, I have come out the other side — stronger. (cue Kelly Clarkson’s lovely song…)
4. At 19, I do not think I could have imagined myself where I am now, and it took me a while to grapple with that fact.

What would I say to her? What would she say to me?

The answer is, she loves me.

And I love her.

So what could I tell you, an unsuspecting 19 year old woman — of the danger that lies ahead? Take the advice that applies.

You have no IDEA how hard your early 20 somethings will be! ENJOY 19!

If there’s one thing I saw in the eyes of 19 year old me, it was absolute obliviousness. Oblivious to the fact that in just a few months, my life would change drastically.

I count my misfortunes more than I count my blessings sometimes, and that’s just a character flaw (or a personality disorder, who knows). From 2019–2023, I have seen the loss of not just loved ones—but property (car accident, RIP 2016 ford fiesta with muffler), a PANDEMIC, wavering health, returning health, a highly publicized firing, coordinated reactionary harassment, not so healthy relationships, mental health issues, a surgery, hospitalizations, and more.

Prior to this, I had my ups and downs as a teenager. I had the childhood/adolescent trauma—but nothing compares to your fully conscious, AWAKE, adult body meeting reality face to face.

My advice:

1. Don’t go through life anticipating the worst, as that will create anxiety. Instead reframe your mindset to anticipate that life will throw things at you, and you need to be level-headed enough to take it and continue on.
2. This won't necessarily apply to everybody, as some of us have the fortune of generational wealth to avoid some of these issues, but I feel like there is a social zeitgeist that exists around the fact that your early 20 somethings will be tumultuous.
3. Pick your battles. Some fights aren’t worth having. If you’re not sure which fights are worth having, just start asking yourself and you’ll get your answer from there.
4. Do not resort to codependency: one of you will always be left out. Unfortunately, we live in a world of hyper-independence and individualism. People will (mostly) always look after themselves before you and you need to accept that that is the majority of people. Try to create the world you want to see by reflecting your own collectivist and comradely behavior, but do not go around expecting the same thing from people. Find your community, if it doesn’t work, work on yourself and build this environment around the things you CAN control.
5. This leads me to the fact that you cannot control everything: you will feel so out of control in your early 20’s. Sometimes you just have to let things happen.
6. Buckle up!

The men that you will meet at 19 will, most likely, not be there for you in a few years time—do your own thing, and stay as independent as possible:

I don’t know what it is, but literally every woman I know—even randos online—have expressed this sentiment now that they’ve come out of their 19 year old flame(s) grasp. I share this sentiment in a bitter-sweet way in that the only negative feelings I hold towards the men I met at 19 are that they didn’t really stick around, and that while they were around they stressed me out beyond belief.

Men who are in their mid to late twenties will hear the blood of your veins rushing 20 miles away and come flocking to you like mosquitos. They feel it appropriate because you’re not straight up barely-legal and it makes them feel better about themselves that they can have some self control and go for a 19 year old.

You, unsuspecting and naïve 19 year old girl, will let them prick and prod at you. You’re 19 and you’re at a peak you do not realize you’re at. But you most likely are. You are growing into yourself, your body, your confidence—womanhood. You are everything a man wants to conquer and unfortunately, some of you will feel the urge to let yourself be conquered.

Whether it was letting guys from bars buy me beers (yes, underage) and getting unsolicited dick pics, to being full blown asked to go out by guys 5+ years your age—you will often say yes because you’re new and want to have fun.

I do not regret saying yes all the time, but I regret not having the knowledge and experience to establish the parameters around my “yes”.

Consent at this early age is almost unconscious. Be careful about who you say yes to, what you’re saying yes to, and know that you have a voice—use it. Advocate for yourself early on, and please, do not be afraid to say “no.” PERIOD.

I often said yes with the intention of getting swept away and saved. That’s what was routine in my family: the women disappear strapped to the back of some testosterone-jacked savior and never seen again (until a wedding, baby shower, whatever.) And that’s exactly what I was looking for.

If you are a 19 year old being “swept away” by an older man, be aware that it’s not because you're special, “mature for your age”, or whatever else you may be thinking. It is because you are young, available, and hurt men are on the lookout for fresh meat.

Looking back, I wish that I would have been more aware of the predatory nature of men and focused more on building myself up to get myself out of the situation I was in. No one was going to save me but myself, and that applies to most of us.

The good thing: I stayed in school, despite numerous situations with men, I remained ambitious and passed all my classes with flying colors, set goals for myself. This was my one life-saver that I know even my 19 year old self had my back on. Don’t ever give your lifesavers like education and passion/career up!

Self-Esteem

You are honestly so much more beautiful (inside and out) than you think.

I didn’t used to believe the whole “kinder eyes” argument—the idea that one day you’d look back at yourself with kinder eyes than you did before, but its honestly 100% true.

Watching that facebook video, I could hear the critiques of my 19 year olds voice popping through my skull. “I look weird”, “I sound weird”, “what am i doing with my feet?”, “why is my hair like that?” — blah blah blah. But soon those critiques became echoes and I found myself fascinated with how much I have changed over the years.

I was once very hard on myself, though I had excellent confidence at that time, there were days that were more rough than others.

I would want every 19 year old girl to at least know that you should be kinder to yourself now, because in a few years time, you will be anyway when you take a look back.

You will come out the otherside, out of all of the times you tell yourself to give up

I found myself giving up a lot in my early 20s. Or at least me telling myself that giving up was the only option. Giving up is a “last resort” as Papa Roach eloquently put it.

I saw this really great tweet that said something along the lines of “sometimes you just have to say ‘i'm going to kms’ and then move on”—and I honestly could not put it better.

Giving up is permanent. I don’t think that you really consider that in the moments of pain.

I found that in seeing my younger self, her ambition remained with me. Her passion remained with me. Her fire, was still burning up inside—ignited by whatever had managed to fan the flames for those 4 years. There I knew that I never listened to myself when I threw my hands in the air and said “I’m done.”

Fall Into Your Passions

I fell into my passions, and that much I can give my 19 year old self credit for. But maybe I could have done so in a more balanced way.

I fell into my communities struggle, for communism!

I fell into my art, but I think I neglected this somewhat.

I fell into writing/poetry, and never got out.

I fell into my education, and am still going strong with an M. Ed. on the way by next Spring!

I fell into my love for music and even made some (secret) sound cloud tracks of my own that I am kind of proud of.

Please never stop doing what you love to do. It will be your saving grace at the end of the day. And when I still struggle at 23, I will leap back into all of these things with full force!

Final Thoughts

Being a woman is difficult. The process of womanhood is a theme much explored in my own writing as well as my art work (plugging cuernosart.myportfolio.com) — it is easier to put your hand in a blender than to willingly and gleefully excrete the contents of your insides out into the world, morphing the contents into the shape of a cocoon you’ll squeeze into and squirm inside for however many years–and come out to finally say “I have reached the other side!” That is woman hood.

19, 20, 21, 22, 23 are beautiful years. I have no regrets. Only a human experience that I have found pain, solace, love, and hate in all at once.

I hope sharing my experience will, if only, help the one person who needs it right now.