Puberty is an ugly season, let’s be real.

So I've been struggling with what has been going on in our world and how many young teens are going through mental health challenges. Whether it's about gender identity, body image issues, dysphoria towards _____, you name it, it seems like it's the norm lately for children to experience sadness, anger, frustration, anxiety and hurt.

I want to share my testimony, now as a 32 year old woman, in hopes to have at least one reader feel like they are not alone, or a little less so than they did before.

I am the eldest of four kids. Girl, boy, girl, boy. My mom had four kids in five years. We were close in age, in each others business and constantly fighting each other. It wasn't out of hatred, it actually became on a weird way our way to get along and love each other. We grew up in the country in France until I was about 10 years old and then moved to key west Florida USA.

When I got to the USA, I was placed in 5th grade. I remember some kids being rude and making fun of me for not being able to "fit in". Which looking back, I think was also my issue when we lived in France because we were the Americans (my mom is American and we were brought up speaking English and French) ... I never felt like I really fit in anywhere.

I was a tomboy. Like I said my brother and I are 13 months apart and we had a family friend who was literally born right in between my brother and I, and we were the inseparable trio. We climbed trees, went on long adventures, set things on fire, played cowboys and Indians, and then some. When I felt girly I played with my sister and her friends and we dressed up and played mom and orphans, and made art and played Barbies. I also had friends my age who'd come and visit and that's also when I was usually more girly than other times...

I was never imposed to have to choose what I identified with, and thank God for that, because I was smack dabbed continuously in-between, changing back and forth betwen being girly, or Tom boyish. I was free to play, have fun with my guy friends and girl friends and never once pressured to choose if one part of my personality was more important or more significant to the point where it had to define a definitive future for myself.

I do remember going through middle school in the states and having that freedom of just being a child, quickly change to having to grow up faster than I was ready for. People talked about boyfriends and having girlfriends in 5th grade and I never once really had considered what it or that really meant. I'll never forget this poor boy asking me out, and I thought he was just asking me to be friends and so when I said yes, my friend at the time was like "wow I can't believe you have a boyfriend now!" To which I was like wait what?! And had to confront him later that day that I had made a mistake in understanding what he was asking. I felt humiliated and embarrassed and ashamed to have to break to him this news.

I now wish I could tell my 10 year old self, it wasn't on you to feel these things. You were a child. And the culture was imposing its sexual perversity on you is not something you need. YOU DO NOT NOR SHOULD NOT HAVE TO TAKE ANY OF IT, EVER.

I wish I had had someone in my life that advocated purity, innocence and the RIGHT to stay "immature" or really just be a child for as long as possible, until you are comfortable being mature enough and without being shamed, mocked, and quite frankly abused mentally or physically.

These young men in key west when I got to high school were literally predators. Every girl was a walking sex object. A potential number to add to their score of what kids would reference as body count, today. The way they danced at school dances, the music that literally played and had lyrics describing intimate moments in details and the only way to not be a loser was to just accept it, and by doing so we laughed and thought it was normal and was cool.

Deep down I hated it, but I also realized I was more tired of being made fun of, that i would rather be someone sought after than made fun of for not being attractive or wanted. What a load of lies.

And even after becoming "sexy" or at least trying to be, I was still never good enough. I was 13 when I was a freshman in High School. Puberty was hard for me because I am petite. And big boobs and big butts were definitely not in my genetic make-up nor could ever be, and so I was reminded daily that my body was only good for it for these guys to like you and take notice of you. There was this guy, and I'll never forget it, who said "you're so flat, you're like a washing board. " Can you imagine 20 years later I can still remember those words. And they haunted me. Made me feel disfigured and have body shame for years. Words cannot be unspoken.

I had guys tell me to get boob jobs, butt job, even once a nose job. I had girls tell me how to dress, what to wear, how to do my makeup, what I should ask for, what to compare myself to, what I should be into, blah blah blah... and we didn't have social media like we do today. Once again, Thank You Jesus !

MySpace had started by the end of junior year, and it wasn't like Facebook, TikTok, Instagram today.

Kids today don't stand a chance to be truly able to feel confident with the amount of toxicity pumped in them from peers, to magazines, movies and shows, teachers, and even parents. Where does a child find refuge?

I couldn't find it then, and turned to alcohol, marijuanna, and men. In other words I did what I could to numb my mind, body, a soul from the pain of not being good enough and no one really caring about me for who I was. I was tired of only being sexualized and reduced to my looks, and just hoped college would be better. And thought throwing myself into those things would give me some sort of control. So when I graduated I was looking forward to starting new. I could be what I wasn't, but what I wanted to be... innocent.

Ya right.

college was worst.

I was 17 as a freshman in college.

I was fresh blood, as I had heard some guys call us girls. And I got myself a boyfriend so I wouldn't be labeled a slut. Somehow, that made me earn the title of a slut. Girls would meet me and say "oh em gee you're not the bitch I thought you were" because they said I was "pretty".

I literally felt like no matter what I did, I could never win. I didn't understand what was going on, or how other girls did it.

Two years and a half in, complete mental breakdown. My mom had to come get me. I literally wanted to get hit by a car as it would make everything easier for me and not have to care about this life anymore.

That's how depressed I was. I spoke to some psychiatrist, psychologist, counselors, and even a neurologist.... and no one really seemed to have the right answer for me. I shared everything with them... from mental abuse, to sexual, to questioning what this life was really all about and it seemed like their answer was a non answer.

a few things happened during that season that got me moving forward again.

I'm laying in bed and mentally told myself I was going to be a "man" and literally just not have anyone bother me anymore as it would be easier that way, and I could picture every cell in me just dying and turning black, with screams in my mind saying don't do this... but I was like too late. And my dad coming in, opening the curtains and telling me enough is enough. There are children and people dying of starvation, war and in horrible situations and I was ridiculously spoiled to be in such a place as this (key west) with the ocean at our back door, too feel this sorry for myself. "Get up, stop feeling sorry for yourself, put your bathing suit on and go for a swim! Enough is enough!"

I did both. Mentally I shut myself off, deciding to end my attractiveness journey, had already a shaved head so I decided to keep it short and stop all pursuit of being "sexy" for men to objectify me and want me (because I realized it didn't help the wounds created from past hurts of being abused) and jumped into the ocean and actually felt alive. Which I hadn't felt in years.

Strange

How you can feel these emotions and they are so real. So much and overwhelming and almost impossible to process at times. And these were complete opposites. Not rational or logical.

To think I was literally allowing myself to go towards having my life end prematurely, but then being grateful for the simplest things like being in the ocean and floating with the sun on my face and making me grateful I could feel its warmth.

Life is messy.

Life can be painful.

But what I know now, is these are seasons that help us connect with each other.

I was 19 when all of this happened and the next 10 years are another set of rollercoaster rides, I think would take another post to write about.

My life changed drastically after this. At 32, I can say that going through just that first part was tough. Really Really ugly at times, and definitely painful.

But what I didn't share, is I would sit in the bus in high school going home, and I always had someone new sit next to me, daily. And they'd share their story. And their story was just as messy, just as complicated, if not more so at times. We are ALL going through this life and trying to figure it out. Even the ones who seem to have it figured out, I can promise you this- they don't.

Jesus today, has given me the confidence to know that we are ALL lost without Him. And without truly having a relationship with Him. And even when we do, life is still messy, still painful, still emotional.

But it's worth it. It's worth it, because you have the ability to help someone else through what they're going through and share the joy that comes in the process of being refined in His Holy image. That there is hope, and light during those stormy moments.

Like I said, I wish I would have had someone tell me this when I was 10 years old or younger. I would have been able to know I didn't have to follow the crowd, I could have just followed Him, and learn what He planned for me and the significance and purpose I have in Him.

But absolutely no regrets. Today, I am confident in who I am in Jesus and He has healed me truly from it all. He is still working a lot of things that I was brought up to believe were true but aren't, but it's done with love, compassion, joy, goodness, gratefulness, and forgiveness. So much that tried to keep me identifying myself as a victim, as ____ and now am truly set free to know that I am His and only identify as His child of God. There's a freedom from that, that nothing in this world could replace it with. Nothing.

I know this started out one way and ends here like this. But it's my testimony to share with you about puberty and what it meant to me when I went through it. It's raw and real. It's messy and all over the place, but that's exactly what it was like for me going through it. I'd rather you see it for what it was , than thoroughly dissected, rewritten, and prepared ... it would remove the essence of its truthful existence.

Hope this helps someone.