When I think of my identity and when I really felt like I started my "journey" (so cliche) to become who I am now I always go back to 2015.
It's the year I refer to as the year I was reborn.
I started to really reflect on who I was, who I wanted to be and what I wanted from life. I was married, I was a housewife and other than raising two small boys I didn't feel like I had much purpose in life. Raising two boys obviously brings a lot of purpose, I won't take away from that. But I felt like that was all I was. Again, not a bad thing, but with my youngest starting school in September of that year and me turning 30 in that same month I felt like it was time to really work out who I was or wanted to be.
I'd lost a lot of weight through eating better and exercising, I spent time with friends and the biggest thing that I will ALWAYS say encouraged my rebirth was visiting the Isle of Man TT for the first time.
Long story short - thought my brother was joking when he invited me. He wasn't. I planned on reading a book whilst he watched the racing because I hated it. The first bike went past me and the love of the sport was injected into my blood and my heart. I BECAME ME!
I came back from the island and got my first tattoos (the only tattoos I would ever have...and only small ones...) and 2 months later separated from my husband. My identity had changed to single mum. No job, no savings...scary but brave.
I then got my job at Wickes, one I thought would "do me for now" whilst I tried to find out what I really wanted in life. Little did I know that 11 years later I would still be with the company and living my admin dreams (I'm being serious, this girl loves a spreadsheet!).
It was scary going back to work after 5 years of being a housewife and stay at home mum, especially working in a retail environment where there were a lot of colleagues as well as the public. I was used to spending my days with two small boys and my mum friends with their small children. I wasn't sure how to act around other adults. I didn't know who I was because I was at the beginning of a new chapter in life and it was a huge one.
From 2015 - 2025 I had:
- Blonde hair, pink hair, purple hair, red hair, brown hair, black hair
- Had long hair and short hair
- Gained weight, lost weight, gained weight, lost weight
- Battled with my mental health
- Gone from "Joules mum" to "Alternative goth"
- Gone from 2 small wrist tattoos...."honestly that's all I've ever have" to having 147 tattoos (oopsy)
- Single mum...the horrors of dating...narcissistic boyfriend...back to the horrors of dating and then meeting a Dutchman who I believe I was destined to meet and spend the rest of my life with
Enter 2026.
I'm now 40. Without choice, as before in 2015, I have felt this complete halt on who I am and a real sense of change needed. I haven't felt entirely conscious with this change. But that's not a bad thing.
After years of covering my grey roots I made a decision to stop covering them and to just grow them out. This is a complete turn around of my previous routine of box dying my hair every 2 weeks, or shorter than that if I had an event or something social in the calendar. If you'd have told me mid-December I'd do that I would have said "but I have to have black hair, it's my identity".
I cut my hair short. If you'd have told me mid-December I'd do that I would have said "but my hair is my comfort blanket, it's my identity".
Since cutting it short and
ghosting the dye I have felt such a sense of freedom and empowerment. I feel a bit like I'm putting a middle finger up to society and how women should conform to "looking younger" and "fighting aging". I get lip fillers for confidence reasons but won't get botox, and now I won't cover my greys because I "might look older than I am".
With that sense of freedom and empowerment though comes a bit of an identity crisis.
Who am I? How would I be pointed out in a crowd? No longer "the one with long black hair and tattoos".
That hair brought me confidence, it was my comfort blanket but I don't want to hide behind that anymore.
As much as I love my hair now, it is a huge change and the self-conscious side of me waits for a negative comment.
I wonder if I can dress how I did or did I just dress like that because it matched the identity the long black hair gave me?
Does going grey mean I have to be mumsy again?
Will it bring other identity changes I'm not aware of?
Will I still be seen as me? And do I even know who "me" is?
As scary as it is to lose your identity and change something that is a big part of who you are, I think as someone who is constantly spending time learning about themselves this is also a really exciting chapter of my life.
I feel like the universe is telling me that this year is going to be a big year of growth for me again. And I trust that. I have to trust that this "identity crisis", although uncomfortable at the moment, will bring around a huge surge of confidence and knowledge of who I am in this chapter of my life.
I'm going to remind myself that "the uncomfortable feeling isn't a stop sign: it's a signpost that you're stepping out of your comfort zone and into your growth zone".
