#personal article

I’m sure we have all heard these phrases in our life before, “stop acting like a child”, “grow up already”, or “you’re a grown up now so you should act like one.” We spend our lives rushing to grow up like we are in a marathon that we later find ourselves forcing others that do not follow this to also behave and grow up.

Growing up is a phase everyone has to go through even if we do not want it. It is sad and hard since you can’t do what you usually do as well as being expected to do everything on your own, even if you might not be able to reach their expectation but still strive to survive and live a comfortable life.

I am Amber | میں امبر فاطمہ | Urdu Aap Beeti

I Am Amber میں امبر فاطمہ

I Am Amber | By Amber Fatima             امبر فردوس تخلص؛ :آیت فاطمہ

        میرا نام میری پہچان. اللہ تبارک و تعالیٰ نے مجھے آج جس مقام سے نوازا ہے وہ مقام سب سے بلند نظر آتا ہے…. بات کچھ یوں ہے کہ میں سمجھتی ہوں جو شخص خود کو پہچان لے، اپنی صلاحیتوں کو سمجھ لے، اسے اگر دنیا مقام نہ بھی دے پھر بھی اسکا مقام سب سے بلند ہوتا ہے اور میرا تخیل مجھے اس نظر سے ہی بلند مقام…

What Annoys Me (Or Just Completely Pisses Me Off)

The title is pretty self explanatory, but I thought I’d switch things up and write something thats not what I normally put on here. It’s more about myself and not about books or reviews for once, and it was kind of fun/therapeutic/etc to make an extensive list about the annoyances I face everyday. It’s supposed to be funny, it’s supposed to be serious, it’s supposed to be relatable.

Please…

I hope it’s not bad form to write this post. On December 19th, 2016, the Russian ambassador to Turkey, Andrey Karlov was assassinated while attending an exhibition called “Russia as seen by the Turks” at an art gallery in Ankara, Turkey. Burhan Ozbilici who works for the Associated Press in Turkey was attending the event by chance after hearing about it and going to see a friend. As he says in an…

This is a small personal essay I wrote about one of my most profound moments in my life. I was only 16 when this happened, and it changed my life. It changed how I viewed the world, others, myself, and it’s the moment I truly realized the impact one can have on someone else. 

Another article that I wrote. Ever since I was young, I dealt with medical issued that lead to appearance and self confidence issues. A decade later, I was able to look back and reflect on what I thought was the worst thing in my life. 

Rascal Flatts calmly croons through my phone speakers as I lounge on the couch with a bag of frozen peas sitting on my face. Three days ago, I had a procedure on both eyes to raise the lids and turn the eyelashes upwards, giving my eyes the illusion of being open and symmetrically aligned. On April 1st of this year, I opted to have my left eye surgically centered, so that my pupils point forwards and my left eye doesn't turn in.

As a child, I had more medical issues than you could count on both hands, feet, and ears. Being too young to participate, my parents made the decision to focus on my breathing and vision issues before the cosmetic issues. Until I was in middle school, everything was always up in the air. My airway was, and still is, a jigsaw puzzle for every doctor we've seen. Throw in a dozen ocular problems, and I'm a medical Rubik's cube. When I was 13, my parents sat me down, and told me what I thought was the best news of my life. "For now, no more procedures. The next time that you have a surgery, it will be on your terms, totally your decision." To me, that read as "no more surgeries. Woohoo!"

Fast forward two more years, and I wasn't so sure. Freshman year of high school, and everything changes. Middle school is awkward, and almost everyone has either braces or glasses. Lucky me, I had both. Everyone knows that middle school is a bumbling mess of acne and bad decisions, and it's okay to screw up once, twice, or 30 times in those three years of school. High school, though, that's when everything should be in your favor, right? All the boys lengthened out, and some even became “cute,” according to my straight and boy-crazy friends. The girls grew and became bustier, makeup and Lululemon leggings became essential. Personally, I wasn't so sure about my transition. Still riddled with glasses and a full mouth of braces, I accepted those.

Something I couldn't get over was my eyes. No matter how much I grew, or how much I changed my style or my interests, my eye still turned in, drooped, and became a magnet for wandering eyes and curious questions. Whenever a little kid was around, I dreaded hearing the question that I know is inevitable: "Why's your eye like that?" Or for the bolder children, there's the statement: "your eye is funny." I respond the same way every time, "I was born like that." I give them the answer that their mother would give them. The answer that they get in order to avoid telling their kids the truth, "I don't know honey. I'm wondering the same exact thing, only I have a social filter.”

I spent years feeling different, and not knowing why or how I could change that. I have a whole different set of problems compared to a normal teenager girl when it comes to body image. In eighth grade, we had to submit baby photos for the yearbook for a special segment about "how much we've grown" or some shit like that. Going through photos with my mother, I was hoping for one thing- a normal photo. We sifted through maybe hundreds of images, from being a newborn until preschool. In each photo, front and center, stands my droopy and swollen eyelids, like I was in a messy bar fight that went too far. I finally decided on one that seemed normal enough, after many hours of deliberation and considering submitting a baby picture of my younger sister to avoid all of the questions. Looking through the yearbook with friends months later, I sat awkwardly as they all cooed over each other's photos. "Look how cute he was!...aw, baby!...So small!...Perry, this is...cute? ...Oh my gosh, the next one is adorable!" Giving a tight-lipped smile, I quickly turned the page to get as far away from my photo as possible.

In the modern world, image is everything. Instagram, Tumblr, magazines and film all push images of what people “should be” or what the ideal American human should “look like.” On one hand, as a female-identifying person, you’re supposed to be this hyper-contradictory perfect image: small waist, petite body, flat stomach, long hair, et cetera. Yet changing yourself to fit into those molds is simultaneously frowned upon. It’s the double edged sword of the modern day. Be skinny, but naturally, because dieting for a body is desperate. Have the perfect face, but don’t use too much makeup or plastic surgery, because that is fake. Be yourself and be an individual, but be an acceptable individual. There’s only so much wiggle room in this iron cast mold of beauty. People break themselves, bruise themselves, kill themselves trying to squeeze into the unattainable template.

I know that plastic surgery is a taboo, and yet a sign of elitism and the finishing touch on the “perfect Los Angeles Woman.” Kim Kardashian’s plastic surgery has brought her millions of fans, tens of millions of haters, but nonetheless, more social media follows and publicity than virtually any other contemporary celebrity. I’ve realized that plastic surgery is something that no one wants to have, but something that everyone secretly wants to say they have. For me, it was never a sign of wealth, or something that I did to turn heads. It was, and will remain as, something that I had to do for myself. When I first heard that celebrities get fake breasts or new noses because they wanted to, I would think what everyone else generally thinks- “Just because there’s the technology to change your face 40 different ways, doesn’t mean you should”. Us normal folk have to deal with the faces and bodies we were dealt, right? I’ve come to realize that it’s not about the money, and it’s not about status. It’s all for me. I did it because I want to feel and know that I look how I want to look. I could not care less if you think it looks nice, or if you think it’s “morally acceptable” to willingly put silicone in my face, because it is not your face. It doesn’t affect you in any way what I do with my body.