I was challenged today. For the first time, I was asked: Why boudoir? What is your Why?
After stumbling around for quite some time, and sending a bunch of meaningless words, I began to quickly realize I was stalling. I know what my Why is. But being able to open up about it and put it into words? It was too raw. Too real. I got anxiety, I got uncomfortable, and I felt out of my element… and then it hit me. That’s exactly what every single one of my clients feel, not only when they reach out, but when they come in for their sessions. I push my clients to open up, to bare their all, and to let me in so that I can help to transform them, to empower them. That is my Why.
For those of you who don’t know me, and maybe even those who do… really opening up about my past, my experiences, dropping those walls, is one of the hardest things for me to do. I can do it blindly in a Facebook group full of people I’ll never meet, but to really reveal just how broken I was at a point in my life is truly devastatingly difficult. Over 13 years ago, I was in an extremely toxic relationship. Domestic violence, emotional torture, gas-lighting, control, narcissism, sexual abuse. I experienced it all with him.
When I finally escaped, shattered remnants of the once happy, confident, strong girl I had been were all around me and I had absolutely no idea how to put them back together. Was it even possible? How do I move on? Am I worth being loved? I’m ugly. Who could ever want me? I was a 22 year-old single mother with an infant, and I was alone. I was completely and utterly broken.
Years passed and I continued to jump from toxic relationship to toxic relationship, until something clicked in my head in early 2018. I had spent the 6 years prior finding someone to fix me. To validate me. To help me piece those broken pieces of me back together again so that I would finally feel whole. And then it hit me. The only person who could truly fix me… was ME. That moment of awareness was the tipping point for me and the absolute feeling of empowerment I felt? That, right there, is my Why.
Boudoir is healing. It’s raw. It’s intimate. And it’s empowering. In the hour I spend with a client, I see all levels of emotion. I see the moment of absolute uncertainty. Of terror. Of shock. Of awe. Of wonder. Of happiness. And finally, of realization. The realization that she is doing this, she is overcoming her fears, and she is everything she never thought she could be. She is real, she is perfectly imperfect, and that is everything to her. That moment of empowerment truly transforms the broken, the hurting, the struggling. She becomes a completely different woman. It gives her a voice. She is whole.
To each of you who is hurting, who is struggling, who is doubting herself, who is broken. I want you to know that I see you. I hear you. I was you. And just like I am, you are so much more than that. Your boudoir session will allow you to be completely reborn from the ashes of your past. When you’re ready to regain that control of your life, of your thoughts, and of your views of yourself: I am here.
Xo, S.
