My first ______.

⚠️ WARNING ⚠️

The following may include the vomiting of words. Continue at your own risk.

Hey guys! Today I wanted to rabble on and on (sorry, not sorry) about a topic I've been thinking a lot about lately. This post is going to be all about firsts: first words, steps, teeth, schools, friends, kisses, boyfriends, times ;), loves, moves, apartments, pets, cars, marriages (hopefully the one and only), houses, kids. And then after all that guess what happens?? Yup, that's right, the firsts start all over again except from a different perspective.

Our culture puts so much emphasis and pressure on our "firsts". A first child is so much more celebrated than the second. When that child speaks her first word, parents

remember that one word for the rest of their lives, no matter how rudimentary the word is. Let's be honest "dog", "cat", "Mama", or "Dada" do not prove in the slightest that the child is going to grow up, go to some Ivy League school, and discover the cure for cancer. But yet, parents still celebrate this tiny victory. When a child walks or even stands for the first time she is rewarded with unconditional praise. When a child begins to grow her first tooth it's a reason for celebration, despite the fact that the tooth will fall out and be replaced. When a child first goes to school and makes her first friends people are overjoyed at the social progress of the child, even though it is in a human's nature to be social and band together out of innate survival purposes.

From this point forward you wouldn't think it could get more complicated, but it does. Once a child enters her first social setting outside of the safety and comfort of her own home and the environment she grew up in, social pressures begin to set in. Soon, all that child can think about are first kisses, first boyfriends, and first times. The pressure multiplies by 2 every birthday, until her lack of experience begins to feel like a burden and a failure. She has to surpass these "firsts" in order to get to the rest, in order to be a success and once again obtain praise. She begins to compare herself to her friends and wonders why she is so behind. She should have most definitely experienced these milestones at this point.

She continues to grow. Birthday after birthday passes until she reaches her first move from west to east and then her first apartment...

and yet the other "firsts" have still not come. She wonders "is there something wrong with me?" "How could I have just moved past and skipped these major firsts?" "That's not how it's suppose to work! Firsts are meant to come in a specific order, you can't just skip over them. How can I move onto the next one without completing the ones that come before?" These thoughts get caught and tangled in the societal web spun in her brain, which started with a first word. Again she feels the pressure to complete these firsts, therefore forcing herself to do so. But then the only joy she feels is the mental check she can put next to these milestones. She feels no joy from the actual experience of these firsts. Instead she feels rushed to complete the next one and the next one, moving right passed the broken image she has of herself, not even stopping to think if she wanted to complete those firsts or

if society wanted to complete them for her. Her brain is locked in first gear, her thoughts only focused on accelerating, ignoring the musings of her heart.

She rushes past, flying through her first pet, her first car, her first "love", right into her first marriage, and first house. Soon she has her first child and one day that baby girl mumbles "Mama". The women who is still really a girl is over the moon because her daughter's "firsts" have begun.

But, despite her joy, she sometimes wonders what her life would look like if she hadn't rushed through her firsts. If instead, she had ignored the societal "truths" and pressures, been patient and waited for these firsts to happen to her versus making them happen for herself. Maybe, she would have less bruises and more love.

Love,

Chloe Noel