I’m 39 today!

#TransparentTuesdays

Hi friend, 

Today is my birthday!

I’m turning 39, which means that I am officially inside the last year of my thirties, with 40 right around the corner. And honestly, I thought I might feel more nervous about starting this “t-minus-a-year” countdown to 40, but so far I feel really good and clear about it. 

Like everyone, I have my own insecurities and fears about getting older, but I’ve always put a lot of stock in the magic of birthdays, and felt really connected to the energy of different age “numbers.” Certain numbers just seem to have a good vibe to them, no? 

Maybe it’s kind of woo-woo, but I remember thinking even back in high school that 33 was going to be “my year,” because the number 33 just struck me as perfect. (Just look at it… it’s symmetrical, balanced, and curvy in all the right places!)

Thirty three was going to be a magical age for me, I could just tell. I didn’t have any issues turning 30, both because I was delighted to be leaving my 20s behind me (good riddance), and also because I knew it meant I was getting close to this magical age of 33, and I couldn’t wait to see what happened!

Tragically, this particular premonition didn’t pan out in the slightest, since what actually happened was that—within a few weeks of my “magical 33rd birthday”— COVID hit, and everything fell apart. 

Don’t worry though! Like anyone committed to their irrational delusions, I didn’t let that stop me from believing in the magic of birthdays or age numbers! I decided instead to take a page from the playbook of rapture enthusiasts worldwide, and chalk it up to a simple user error. 

“Whoops, I guess I must have gotten the number wrong— the magic year was probably supposed to be 44, not 33! Tee-hee!”

Yes yes, I know, this all makes me sound ridiculous and insane, but I find a lot of lighthearted joy in thinking about my life this way, so I do not care. 

That said, not all numbers have felt quite as friendly and welcoming, or as easy to step into. 

For example, I had a complete meltdown and quarter-life crisis at 25, because I came to the sudden and galling realization that I was no longer in my "early 20s,” which threw the life I was living into stark relief, and motivated me to make a whole bunch of big life changes very quickly. 

But even that crisis, as painful as it was at the time, was ultimately rooted in a lot of magic, because it’s what led to me investing in myself, starting a business, and getting unstuck in ways that I still benefit from today!

With that in mind, I fully reserve the right to have a mid-life crisis whenever the time is right… and for all I know, that time will be next year as I face 40!

But as of right now, I’m feeling really good about finishing out my 30s strong, and setting myself up for the next decade to be the best one yet. (Don’t come for my delusions, lol.)

Anyway, I’m sharing all this because I know it’s weird to admit that I love getting older. 

Women and femmes are conditioned to think of aging as scary and bad, because according to society, our value comes from being young, attractive, and fertile! (Barf.)

When we buy into that idea, it makes sense that we would become completely terrified of “losing our value” as we get older, exiting our reproductive years, and aging out of conventional beauty and body ideals. How could getting older ever feel safe—let alone positive—when it’s so closely associated with invisibility, irrelevance, and disrespect?

I know that many of you have been following and reading my work for years, so we’ve sort of “grown up” together, and I consider it to be an extraordinary honor and privilege to age alongside my community, whether we’re around the same age or not. 

It feels deeply right to me that my “target demographic” has gotten older as I have, because even though I love working with young people to feel more confident and comfortable in their skin, I think conversations about body image and self-worth only get more interesting and important as we get older. 

After all, a lot of the confidence, self-acceptance, and body neutrality we cultivate when we’re younger is conditional, without us even realizing it… and aging can have a deeply unsettling way of shining a light on that conditionality, and the places where our sense of safety and value is still rooted in social hierarchies and conditioning. 

Recently, for example, I’ve had several old clients reach out about coaching, because after years of peacefully enjoying a certain amount of body neutrality and acceptance from our original work together, they’ve discovered brand new insecurities and fixations popping up around getting older!

This makes sense, because we tend to only heal the wounds that are relevant to us at any given time. If you’re struggling with shame and dysmorphia about your body size, internalized fatphobia, and disordered eating, you’re probably going to focus your healing work around those issues.

In the process of that work, you might inadvertently identify and strip away other layers of internalized oppression, bias, and belief as well, and you’ll probably gather new tools, skills, and mindset changes that help you cultivate a more positive and resilient sense of identity and overall— all of which will absolutely make you less vulnerable to other body image issues!

But ultimately, if the goal of that work is to find peace in your relationship to food and body size, then there will come a time when you feel like you’ve more or less “arrived” in that place—or at least, that you know how to handle those moments when they show up— and you’ll naturally find yourself drawn to working on or thinking about other things. 

Without food and weight taking up so much of your mental real estate day to day, your time and energy will naturally get directed elsewhere. 

For a while you might be focused on other “issues” your body neutrality journey brought to light, and spend the next chunk of “healing time” in therapy focused on healing from old traumas, reconsidering certain relationships, making a big career change, getting sober, or understanding your neurodivergence. Maybe you take a break from deep healing work for a while and just pour your energy into building community, cultivating new hobbies, raising a family, getting involved in activism, or pursuing your dreams. 

Either way, you’ll be getting older, day by day, as you focus on other things. 

And at some point you might look in the mirror, or realize you’re in perimenopause, or notice some other change to your face or body, and be like… oh shit.

Sometimes these kinds of moments happen all at once. One of my clients, for example, had a major breakthrough after her divorce in her early 40s, and told me that for five or so years after working together, she was gratefully enjoying the feeling of finally being sexually embodied, free, and confident. 

But then one day (according to her) she woke up and that feeling was just gone. She knew that her hormones were probably to blame, but reported that her face and body seemed to have aged dramatically and almost overnight, while her sex drive, mental health, sense of self, body image, and overall confidence seemed to have crumbled to nothing, just as suddenly. 

I hear stories like hers pretty often, both because hormones can have a rapid impact on visible and physical signs of aging, and also because a lot of people just don’t look at themselves very often, so their self-concept and body image is rooted in a younger version of them, and it can be very jarring to suddenly realize you don’t look like the version of you that’s in your head.

Other times, though, age-related body image issues develop more gradually as a person watches themselves age in real time, and slowly becomes insecure about those changes, and what they believe those changes mean about them.

All of this is to say that it’s normal to have to swing back and revisit your body neutrality and self-acceptance work as you get older. 

New insecurities and fears tend to show up as the “conditions” within which you previously found peace change, and a lot of the negative thoughts and feelings about your aging body/appearance that seem “new” are actually just older and deeper stuff that is finally working its way to the surface as it becomes more relevant. 

I say all this because I think it’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking that our sense of identity is (or should be) fixed, stable, and consistent, when nothing could be further from the truth. 

The relationship we have with ourselves is just that: a relationship. And like all relationships, it’s a living and breathing thing that requires both room to grow and change, and an ongoing commitment to attention and care. 

Getting older is a privilege, to be sure, but it’s also a responsibility. For as long as you have a body (and an identity), you’ll have to tend to your relationship with it. 

If you happen to be looking for some extra support in this area, I just dropped the fourth module of material for my self-study course on Patreon called Age Neutrality: Feeling Confident & Body Neutral as Your “Looks Fade”! 

I publish a new module there every month, so if you want access to this course, all you need to do is sign up for my Patreon at the $25 level (or higher), and you’ll find everything you need!

And since it’s my birthday, I’d also like to add here that subscribing to my Patreon is the perfect place to support me and my work! 

If you’ve gotten value from my free content (whether here, or from my youtube or podcast) and want to support me in being able to continue putting this kind of content out into the world, I would very much appreciate it if you’d consider subscribing to my patreon at any level! 

You can join for $2/month if you just want to say thank you, $5/month if you want to join the monthly community zoom calls, $25/month if you want to get monthly course material (like Age Neutrality), or one of the two higher levels if you want to work with me privately.

Of course, you just being here and reading what I write means the world to me, so no worries if financial support isn’t your vibe. But I rarely promote my Patreon, and I figured today would be the perfect day.

Also, if you’re looking for more individualized support when it comes to aging, body image, or your relationship with yourself more generally, you can always apply for private coaching with me here! 

I’m hoping to connect with y’all in new ways in 2026—so feel free to hit reply and let me know what you’ve been struggling with, interested in, working on, or looking for help with lately!

Sending you all some birthday magic today,

Jessi