when i was 13, i wanted a lip reduction

it's not even called a lip reduction - it's lip dissolving and i wasn't eligible (sigh💋)

I recently accompanied one of my best friends to her lip filler appointment; our other best friend perched beside me in the adjacent chair as we waited in the foyer. We nattered and chattered about whatever the heck young women in their 20s discuss (unworthy men, makeup and world denomination) when I disrupted my thinking by realising how surreal this experience was:

My best friend is in the next room getting her lips injected by a (really friendly) aesthetician in the basement of a salon.

This is not significant in any capacity except that, once upon a time, I yearned¹ to get a lip reduction, and I remember when it all began: in a PE lesson at my all-girls school in year 8. Two of the girls I quickly befriended upon joining a new class were a blonde-haired, blue-eyed Brazilian girl and a curly-haired mixed-race girl, both with thinner lips — this is merely an observation, not a dig, and has been mentioned to aid the development of this article :) Anyway, our teacher paired us together, and they began talking about my lips, using words like ‘ballooning’ to describe them, even making monkey jokes…we’ve come a long way since 2013 (I’m lying).

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“Your lips are really big,” said the curly-haired girl, covering her mischievous smile with her hand.

“They’re really not,” I defended, conscious that they were both staring at my lips. Our Brazilian friend giggled in support of her friend.

“Show us your lips then,” she said, still laughing.

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I showed them, slightly biting the inside of my bottom lip to make sure it didn’t jut out as much as I knew it would naturally. They laughed at this, catching me out on my pretence. I laughed in response to hide my hurt and embarrassment, only for my lip to unravel itself to its natural fullness. I went home that day and googled ‘can u get a lip reduction’.

Lord, the eyebrows🫣 No comments will be made at this time.

Have you ever heard of that? I was 13 years old when I realised that a lip reduction may not be possible, but lip dissolving can, a procedure you usually get done once you’ve had lip filler. I had not, obviously.

If you’ve been here since my last newsletter, you’ll know that I’m 23. The ship of considering this has long sailed, but sometimes I still laugh (frustratingly) at the fact that I ever took this seriously. More so now because, of those two girls, one was considering getting lip fillers and spent most of her time over-lining her lips, and the other has got lip fillers now. The irony.

Isn’t it funny how long those projections can be internalised for? Those sneaky false insecurities that are based on someone else’s personal desires or faults. Today, of course, my lips are never complimented more. In fact, when I was 17 years old, a friend in sixth form said, “Oh my God, your lips are perfect!” and yet my response was still to shield them. Another time, a woman stopped me in my local town to ask me where I had got my lips done, and when I said they were natural, she said: “No, seriously - who’s your aesthetician?”

Perhaps in this newsletter, I dwell in self-pity and annoyance at the brewing of this almost decade-long insecurity. But the bigger picture is how many of us have our assets magnified only for our feelings (or confidence) about them to be minimised due to baseless projections? Even more so, I’d be so annoyed if one of my younger students or the young girl I nannied approached me to ask about getting cosmetic work done. I think my heart would shatter slightly.

And don’t get me started on, whether secure within themselves or not, Black women have to grapple with these unwarranted suggestions of what makes us look ‘right’ or ‘better’. Most simply, take how Bratz dolls² were responded to compared to Barbie dolls when they served the same purpose for young girls. I remember wanting to wear lipstick and lip liners because of them. My QUEENS. The former was seen as rebellious for merely existing within their fiction but outside of the norm, and the other was praised constantly and consistently for, well, conforming — and would you look at how that’s manifested? You can’t make this shit up.

This made me realise that I really am a combination of the Bratz girls.

In 2022, a study³ reported that 36% of young British women between 18-24 had considered facial cosmetic surgery, and of the most sought-after procedures, it is under the eyes first and lips second. One can suspect that this statistic may have increased, although I’ve seen a lot of dissolving stories come up on my TikTok FYP (hello, why me?)

This year, beauty specialist, journalist, and now author Ellen Atlanta (one of my inspos) published her first book, ‘Pixel Flesh: How Toxic Beauty Culture Harms Women’. In it, she predominantly explores the impacts of our increasingly digital world on how we (womxn) perceive ourselves against this tech-heavy backdrop. She also looks at beauty eras and stereotypes we have evolved from or conformed to, analysing whether we’ve really changed at all — and in most cases, it feels like we’ve worsened.

A chapter that resonated was ‘The Fetishisation of Youth’. Atlanta outlined that “desirability is filtered through an ageist, patriarchal lens, intent on sexualising and pedestalling very young girls,” and then: “it’s an intensely dark and disturbing form of violence on the female psyche.” Not long after my friends made those comments about my lips, we’d soon graduated from it being a reason for me to be insecure to something that “boys love.” Suddenly, I became hyperaware of this ‘asset’ that would make me more sexually appealing to the people I was told in the movies had ‘cooties’, and I didn’t want to be.

Certainly, after Kylie’s lip injection saga, I watched how other women — who looked nothing like me — were fawned after for the very feature that I was born with. I also remember the weird relief and rejoicing that arose on social media when fans realised she had dissolved her lip filler, to which she responded that she wanted her daughter to see her at her most natural — before going under the needle again soon after. And what if I just want to be embraced at my most natural? How about that? There is simply no winning, it seems.

Photos from Kylie’s Instagram in 2018 when she first got her lips dissolved. According to Doctor Nyla, one LA-based surgeon reported a 30% increase in women wanting to get their filler dissolved after seeing Kylie had done so.

Only now do I feel more compassionate than vengeful for that idea that my young friends had laid into me — they weren’t to know better, and honestly, neither was I. It’s difficult growing up as a young woman, encouraged to hold onto your youth and ‘not waste your golden years’ but to equally look to the future and ‘the woman you can be’ and ‘how to prevent ageing’. What if I want to age? Sometimes, I feel it would shelter and protect me from so much of the harshness, violence and futile notions concentrated on young women. Additionally, it’s quite hurtful to watch all the reasons why Malcolm X said, “The most disrespected person in America is the Black woman,” unfold before your eyes for Black women globally.

Still, with the uncertainty and lack of consistency displayed by the global powers we’re supposed to trust, I’ve learned whose understanding not to lean on, and my younger self is thanking me for it.

BTW, I also want to take this time to say that I’m not opposed to getting cosmetic surgery beyond health benefits for others. Insecurities can rob you of great moments, and if the options and means are there, why not? I do believe in everything in moderation, but I also don’t want to tamper with things that were perfectly designed before I learn to appreciate them ❤️

Sometimes, our youthful naivety and, let’s be honest, stupidity can cause us to reach absurd conclusions. Our rush and need to be older than we’ve ever been but still young mean we battle the tension between what’s to come and what we can do with our present. Both are beautiful when we approach them correctly, patiently, and honestly. In addition, both can be treacherous when approached otherwise.

Admittedly, I have always been one to rush; impatience is my fatal flaw. Thankfully, my low pain tolerance has saved me from physically making bodily modifications that I wasn’t sure of or ready for, but still, that hasn’t stopped me from ‘adulting’ in other ways. When I was 13, I wanted to be 16. When I was 18, I wanted to be 21. I’m now 23 (say it one more time, Aswan), excited for 25 — so my frontal lobe can fully form, DUH. And dare I say I’m glad a recent TikTok I watched validated that 30 is the new 25? Needless to say, it’s ten years later, and I still haven’t found the knack for embracing where I’m currently at.

And I don’t think I ever have been :) Hugs and kisses to all affected xxx

So, here are some things I’m doing to enjoy the present (I bet you didn’t think I was going to make this somewhat productive):

1. Praying

2. Getting off my phone and sticking to my time limit.

3. Reading (for fun, again — NO annual Goodreads challenges).

4. Listening to Ariana Grande and Justin Bieber (because I’ll never sing the words ‘baby’ that many times otherwise, and that feels not-so-23, definitely-a-teen).

5. Eating dinners with my mum, when I can.

6. Journalling…lots and lots and lots of it.

7. Going to the gym. Zumba with Mc Estacio, yes please!

8. Girls' nights - these are my favourite things ever!

9. Working on this substack.

10. Plugging into communities that I can pour into and that pour into me.

BONUS: Decentering men xxx

So far, it’s been fun. Have you noticed how they all require you to slow down in order to properly appreciate them? When you get older, and if you are ever blessed enough to be freelance (this is sarcasm), it’ll be hard to build a routine that truly prioritises you. But doing so means not only am I learning my current self and everything I like (love) about her, but I’m also hugging my younger self, the inner child who remains within me but has been missing out on some much-needed TLC. How dare I neglect her?

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I have pictures of my younger self on my phone and around my desk, and I’ve never realised how prominent my young face was in my every day because I was going too quickly. I was a beautiful little girl with smiling eyes, chubby cheeks, and perfect lips — I still have them, thank God. But I look closely and see my mother’s nose and my father’s eyes. I can’t tell whose lips I got; maybe a mix, but it’s theirs. I’M theirs.

Amidst all those years spent rushing growing up, but anti-ageing, and wanting to get away from my parents, yet needing their wisdom or warm embrace at any shaking moment, hurting myself while those who loved me begged me to just simply stay, wanting to reduce the impact of the love that is felt when my lips kiss the people I love, I just have to hold on and remember…

How blessed am I?

1. I’m not using this word lightly. There was nothing more I wanted.

2. I can’t develop upon this line of thought because it’s not entirely original and a writer I really admire is writing about it so, I’ll let her master the thoughts I really want to express on this :)

3. Patient Claim Line report