“Dear 14-Year-Old Me…”
Dear 14-year-old me,
You’re about to start noticing things you don’t quite understand.
Not in a dramatic way. Nothing that feels urgent enough to name. Just small moments that sit quietly in the background. A feeling that something is different. A question that forms and then disappears before you say it out loud.
You won’t have the words for it yet.
And that’s the part I wish I could change for you.
Because what you’re going to experience over the next few years isn’t a lack of awareness. It’s not that you won’t notice what’s happening in your body. It’s that you won’t know how to explain it — not to other people, and sometimes not even to yourself.
You’ll think that’s normal.
You’ll assume that everyone else understands things you don’t.
They don’t.
There will be moments when you feel something shift — physically, emotionally, mentally — and your first instinct will be to question yourself.
Is this normal?
Am I overthinking this?
Should I just ignore it?
Most of the time, you’ll choose the last option.
Not because you don’t care. But because you don’t want to sound dramatic. Because you don’t want to ask a question that feels awkward or unnecessary. Because no one has ever really shown you how to talk about these things in a way that feels comfortable.
So you’ll wait.
You’ll wait for it to go away.
You’ll wait until it feels serious enough to mention.
You’ll wait until you’re more certain.
And sometimes, that waiting will make things harder than they needed to be.
I want to tell you something clearly, because no one says it enough:
Not having the words does not mean what you’re feeling isn’t real.
You are not supposed to know how to describe everything yet.
No one taught you.
No one explained the difference between discomfort and pain.
No one showed you how to track patterns in your own body.
No one told you what kinds of questions you’re allowed to ask.
So when you sit there thinking, “I don’t even know how to explain this,” that’s not a failure.
That’s a gap.
And it’s not your fault.
There will be times when you start to notice that other people seem more confident speaking about their health.
They’ll use words you don’t recognise. They’ll describe things clearly, like it’s easy.
It will make you feel like you’re behind.
Like you’ve missed something.
You haven’t.
You’re just learning in real time what should have been taught to you earlier.
And eventually, you’ll start to build that language yourself.
You’ll begin to notice patterns.
You’ll realise that something happens at certain times.
That a feeling comes and goes in a specific way.
That what once felt confusing can slowly become clearer when you pay attention.
It won’t happen all at once.
But it will happen.
There will also be moments when you hesitate to speak, even when you do have the words.
You’ll worry about how it sounds.
What if it’s not serious enough?
What if I’m overreacting?
What if they don’t understand me?
Sometimes, you’ll stay quiet because of that.
And I understand why.
But here’s what I wish you knew earlier:
You don’t need to wait until something becomes unbearable to talk about it.
You don’t need perfect words.
You don’t need to justify why something matters to you.
If something feels different, confusing, or uncomfortable, that is already enough to bring it up.
Even if the sentence comes out messy.
Even if it starts with “This might not make sense…”
That still counts.
You’re also going to grow up in environments where certain topics feel harder to talk about than others.
Some conversations will feel awkward. Some will feel like they’re not meant to be spoken out loud.
You might notice that people change the subject quickly. Or laugh things off. Or respond in ways that make you feel like you shouldn’t have asked.
When that happens, it will be tempting to stop asking altogether.
Please don’t.
Not every space will know how to hold your questions. But that doesn’t mean your questions don’t deserve to be asked.
There are people, places, and conversations where your voice will be met with understanding.
You just haven’t found all of them yet.
There’s something else I want you to understand, because it will take you time to realise it:
Learning to speak about your body is not just about information.
It’s about confidence.
It’s about trust.
It’s about believing that what you feel is worth paying attention to.
Right now, that belief might not come naturally.
But it will grow.
Every time you notice something.
Every time you reflect instead of dismissing it.
Every time you say something out loud, even if you’re unsure.
Those small moments matter more than you think.
If I could give you one thing, it wouldn’t be all the answers.
It would be language.
Words for what you feel.
Words for what you don’t understand.
Words that help you connect the experience in your body to the conversation outside of it.
Because once you have language, something shifts.
You stop second-guessing yourself as much.
You start recognising patterns sooner.
You begin to feel less alone in what you’re experiencing.
And most importantly, you realise that understanding your body is not something reserved for experts.
It’s something you are allowed to learn too.
So if you ever find yourself sitting there, unsure how to explain what you’re feeling, I want you to remember this:
You are not behind.
You are not overthinking.
You are not being dramatic.
You are learning.
And learning how to understand your own body — slowly, imperfectly, and in your own time — is one of the most important things you will ever do.
Even if the first sentence you say is:
“I don’t really know how to explain it…”
That is still a beginning.
— The Aletheia Project
Originally published by The Aletheia Project on Medium.
