Just Give It Time

Puberty is supposed to be inevitable, but for me, it never arrived. I never got my period. Not at twelve, not at fourteen, not at sixteen. It never came.

At first, no one noticed—not my friends, not my family. Everyone assumed I was going through the same changes they were. But I knew, and I was ashamed. Too ashamed to tell anyone. The shame wasn’t something they placed on me; it came from within. Watching the girls around me change while I stayed the same, I convinced myself there was something deeply wrong with me, something unfixable.

At first, I waited. It would happen eventually. Just late, that’s all. But as the years passed and nothing changed, I started to panic. My friends talked about their periods—complaining about cramps, about the hassle, about tracking their cycles. At thirteen, at fourteen, it was easy enough to just listen. To nod along. To act like I understood. But by fifteen, I couldn’t just be quiet anymore—it was noticeable. So I started pretending.

If a friend complained about cramps, I’d agree. If someone mentioned the worst part of their period, I’d echo them. I borrowed their discomfort, their irritation, their routine, and made it my own. I wasn’t just hiding—I was impersonating. I built a version of myself that blended in, even though I knew it was a lie.

Pretending was how I survived. And with every lie, the shame deepened. It became a wall between me and everyone I loved, an invisible barrier that kept me apart. I didn’t just feel different—I felt like an imposter, a fraud. And no one could ever know.

I buried that feeling under a polished exterior. I made sure no one could see the cracks in my confidence. But inside, I judged myself harshly. My mind would go to dark places, imagining the worst—that I was somehow defective, alien. I didn’t think about the long-term implications of these fears. I just focused on hiding them. In a world where I felt like an outsider, the most important thing was not to look like one.

The Armor of Perfection

I couldn’t reconcile the gap between what I saw in the mirror and what I thought I should be. So I built a mask—a curated version of myself that others could accept. I stuffed my bra, wore loose tops, tight jeans, and perfected my makeup. In the 80s, when broad shoulders and small chests were trendy, I could almost blend in. I became an extrovert, someone people might call confident, even outgoing. But in private, I fretted. I picked apart every piece of myself that felt wrong.

I hated the girl I hid inside. Not because anyone else rejected me, but because I rejected myself.

Perfectionism became my shield and my prison. I convinced myself that if I could just be good enough—perfect enough—no one would notice what I lacked. But that perfectionism came with a price. It made me untouchable, too afraid to be vulnerable, too guarded to let anyone close enough to expose my secrets.

Reinvention & the Trap of Self-Perception

South Street was a place where I could become whoever I wanted to be. It was alive—punk kids, artists, musicians, people who had thrown off whatever expectations had been placed on them and decided to exist on their own terms. I wanted that. I wanted to believe I could do that.

And for a while, I played the part. I styled my hair in edgy cuts, thrifted clothes that made a statement, and imagined myself as someone interesting—someone who belonged there. I could pretend, for a little while, that I wasn’t carrying fear and shame with me everywhere I went.

I met a musician there. He worked in one of the stores I wandered into, and I was immediately smitten. He was beautiful, effortlessly cool. He had the kind of presence that made people orbit around him. I idolized him in a way only a teenage girl can idolize a boy she has no hope of getting close to.

Except, I did. Or at least, he let me. I hung around his shop. I talked to him when I could. I made excuses to be near him. But in my mind, I was always the annoying kid buzzing around, orbiting without ever being truly seen. I didn’t allow myself to believe he could have ever thought of me any differently.

Why? Too risky. He’d see right through me. I would only ever see myself as a silly kid, even when he saw me differently. And I couldn’t even see that he was interested.

Years later, he sent me a cassette tape and a letter. He wrote me a song and told me he had feelings for me. And I still couldn’t see it. Even at 20, I was trapped inside the perception I had created of myself—the one where I wasn’t someone who could be wanted. I didn’t know how to break free from it.

I could pretend on South Street. I could invent myself. But love wasn’t pretend. Love wanted something real. And I wasn’t ready for that.

Boys & the Art of Emotional Misdirection

I had boyfriends. Real ones. I fell in love. But love didn’t feel safe—not in the way it should have.

One of my closest relationships in high school was with someone who would later become one of my best friends. We could be affectionate, we could be close, and yet I never had to fear the moment when I’d have to expose the truth of my body. Years later, in our twenties, he came out to me. That explained it—why I never had to navigate the pressure of moving forward physically, why that relationship felt safe in a way no others did.

But my most serious high school relationship? That was real. He was older—a senior in college while I was a senior in high school. I loved him, my family loved him. He was a boyfriend I could see a future with, and we talked about it. But there was only so long before the relationship had to move forward.

I took him to my senior prom. I knew what prom night meant. I knew what it was supposed to mean. And I knew I couldn't do it. But it wasn’t just about sex. It was about the fear of being seen. The fear of being exposed. The fear that if I let things go too far, he would realize there was something wrong with me. And I couldn’t risk that. So instead of facing that truth, instead of finding the words to explain what I didn't yet understand about myself, I started to create distance.

There was no plan, spoken or unspoken, to move the relationship forward on prom night. He wasn’t pressuring me in any way. But I knew, deep down, that we were getting closer, that eventually, I wouldn’t be able to avoid it. And instead of facing that truth, instead of finding the words to explain what I didn't yet understand about myself, I sabotaged it.

We fought about something trivial—smoking, of all things. I had just started. He didn’t like it. So I picked that fight, let it ruin the night. We went to the afterparty. We went on the trip to Six Flags the next day, just like everyone else. And then I disappeared.

It wasn’t called ghosting back then, but that’s what I did. I stopped answering the phone. I wasn’t around when he called. I let the relationship crumble rather than confront what was coming. Eventually, my mother had to mail back the ring he had given me.

I loved him. And I walked away without a word. I still feel a deep sorrow when I think about him. He was kind. He was patient. He loved me. And I disappeared without giving him the dignity of the truth. I didn’t know how to say it—not to him, not to myself. So I said nothing. And I’ve carried that silence ever since.

Because I didn’t have the experience, the maturity, or the knowledge to articulate what I was afraid of.

A Nightmare Before Christmas

There were always reminders I was different and it became normal to just ignore them, but when my little sister got her period, it was devastating.

December 17, 1984. I was sixteen, and George C. Scott’s A Christmas Carol had just started on TV. when my 11-year-old sister walked into the room, beaming. “I got my period,” she announced.

My stomach dropped. It felt like the wind had been knocked out of me. She was so proud. So unaware of what her moment meant to me. I managed to say something supportive, but inside, the shame and panic were roaring. I had just been passed by. My little sister was moving forward, hitting the milestone I had waited years for, and I was still stuck.

My mom followed her upstairs. I could hear them talking in low tones, doors opening and closing, the muffled comfort of mother and daughter sharing something routine. But I wasn’t part of it. I never had been.

I stayed downstairs, frozen in place, watching A Christmas Carol and feeling even more that I was damaged in some deep way that I could never face.

The irony didn’t escape me. Scrooge was being visited by ghosts, forced to look at the pain he had buried, the love he had turned away from. It struck me that his coldness hadn’t come from nowhere. It had come from grief. From fear. From being alone for so long he no longer believed he deserved connection.

I felt that. Not because anyone had rejected me. But because I had already decided I was unworthy. That no one could help. That no one should have to. That night didn’t break me. But it hardened something in me I wouldn’t soften for years.

I say alone watching the TV, feeling more alone than I’d ever felt in my life.

A Living Wake

I remember the pain—searing, sharp, and in my lower abdomen. When I went to the bathroom, I saw blood. I thought, finally—this is it. But the pain was stabbing, intense, and only happened when I peed. I didn’t know what it was, but I was terrified. I didn’t tell anyone; I didn’t even consider it. I just convinced myself that I was dying.

I didn’t tell my friends, but I did manage to gather them—including two boys from out of town who had become very close with us—and have one of the best weekends of my teenage life. It was perfect in so many ways, just hanging out with people I loved, laughing until our faces hurt, and feeling the thrill of freedom that you can only feel at 17. It was perfect, and it felt like goodbye.

I laughed until my face hurt, held onto my friends a little tighter, let the joy wash over me like I could soak it up for the rest of my life. But underneath it all, I was waiting. Waiting to feel worse. Waiting for the moment when pretending wouldn’t be enough anymore. Waiting to disappear. Waiting to die. 

Of course, it was just a bad bladder infection—left untreated, by the way, because I was too scared to tell anyone. But that weekend left an impression on me, the moment I came face to face with my own fear and isolation, still unable to let anyone know what was really going on inside of me.

That weekend, I convinced myself I could pretend a little longer. But the fear always came back. And one day, it was too much.

A part of me was disappointed I didn't die. I was getting more and more desperate and afraid that something serious was wrong with me, but there was nothing I could do to talk about it or face it. I wasn’t just hiding anymore. I was burning bridges, cutting ties—destroying anything that might uncover my secret before I even understood it myself.

I was desperate.

One day, just before the end of high school, I was so afraid of this secret I took my dad's service revolver from the closet. I sat with it in my lap on our living room floor, and considered using it to end the fear. 

I don't know what stopped me. I couldn't imagine leaving the mess for someone to clean up, maybe? Or maybe I was just too scared to take that final step. Too unsure. Too full of questions I couldn't answer. I told myself I had another chance to reinvent myself. I was going to college. That would change everything. 

Facing the Doctor

But before that day, I'd need to face my fear in a way I had dreaded for years—a physical exam that would force me to confront the truth I had been avoiding. My mom decided to spring a visit on me a few days before my eighteenth birthday as part of my college entrance requirements.

In a way, this was a brave move for my mother. My parents had struggled with infertility, and my mother had endured years of medical interventions that left her deeply distrustful of doctors and their authority. She rarely spoke about it, but the fear was there, in the way she avoided medical appointments whenever possible.

Her medical trauma echoed through my life and was the reason I was eighteen and had never been to a doctor to find out why I had not entered puberty..

As we entered his office, my mother, clearly uncomfortable, said, “I guess we can ask him about this period stuff.” My stomach flipped. I panicked.

This was really happening. There was no way I’d get out of his office without the truth being discovered. I sat in the waiting room, my hands clenched in my lap, my heart pounding. In my nervousness, I blurted out, “I had some bleeding a few weeks ago.” It was a lie. I was talking about the bladder infection, but I needed her to believe it. My mother exhaled in relief. “Good,” she said. “I guess that was a little period.”

I thought that was enough to satisfy her. But then we got to the exam room. The doctor ran through the most basic elements of a physical exam. He listened to my heart, checked my blood pressure. He didn’t ask me any real questions. Maybe he assumed I was shy. Maybe he was in a hurry. And then my mother, as if it were an afterthought, said, “She hasn’t gotten her period.”

I froze. My chest tightened. This was it. He would examine me. He would ask questions. He would see through me.

But he didn’t.

He barely reacted. He smiled, patted my hand, and said, “Just give it time.”

Just give it time.

I was almost eighteen years old. Time was not the issue. His words were absurd, but I clung to them anyway. Because if he wasn’t worried, I didn’t have to be. If he could dismiss it so easily, then maybe I could, too.

Just give it time.

I believed him. And my mother believed him. And that was that. It would be ten years before I realized what a huge mistake both my mother and my doctor made that day. 

We left the office. The fear I had carried in with me, the fear I had carried for years, settled deeper inside me. I had been given permission to keep pretending.

Just give it time.

That’s what the doctor said. That’s what my mother accepted. That’s what I told myself for years—because if no one else was worried, why should I be?

Just give it time.

That was permission to keep pretending. To stay distant in relationships. To live in fear of being found out. To convince myself I wasn’t worth checking up on, wasn’t worth worrying about, wasn’t worth making a priority.

Just give it time.

And I did. For years. I buried the fear under perfection, under self-denial, under silence. I told myself waiting was the answer, that time would fix what was broken.

But time didn’t fix it.

I had to.