I received my first bravery award when I was 4 years old. Alongside firefighters and rescue people, a little lady with a big scar toddled up to the stage.
My accomplishment? Not dying from open heart surgery.
Since I can remember, I have been told the story about how my doctors wanted to film me to show other children how good I was when I would be given needles or have to get invasive tests.
Posters of me at 4 years old, in my knickers, fresh scar straight down my chest, a machine breathing for me, would be hung up in local shopping centers to raise money for the heart kids foundation. My dad was on the board, my mum would volunteer at the booths.
From infancy, I was taught that my worth was tied to how well I could take a hit. Overcoming suffering became part of my identity.
Since then it has only been reinforced. I have been on the news, met celebrities, and received more bravery awards. As time went on, being broken (adopted, sexually abused, bulimic, anxious, and unable to maintain romantic relationships) became a huge part of my brand.
A brand that started during the chaos of my childhood, when I began to write. Long before social media, I used writing as my therapy. I got pretty good, teachers and other adults started to notice, so I shared my words with more people.
At 23 I posted my first blog. It was about leaving a bad relationship. I shared my open wounds for the public to consume. Just as I had been taught to do as a child.
I was celebrated once again. The dopamine hit that came with every comment and message was intoxicating. Overcoming hardship firmly became part of my identity. During the next two years, I shared my biggest heartaches and my biggest failures.
Being "raw", "vulnerable", and "an inspiration" became embedded in my art and my psyche. I raised money to house a woman in Greece, I stood on stage's to tell my story, and I was put in contact with a writing agent.
My suffering and my success became intertwined. Every achievement was juxtaposed with what I had overcome. I was scared of leaving any of the hurting people I had connected with behind, and, if I'm honest, losing my audience and the connection that came with it.
Which is exactly what happened when I started to talk about other things. I watched my views and likes and comments drop when I would post about the things I was passionate about like politics, social issues, and current affairs. I would watch them rise when I would bleed onto the keyboard. I learned, again and again, that I am most valuable when I am taking hits.
Last year I took a lot of hits, I lost a future I was deeply invested in, a person I was deeply connected to, a driver's license I had never needed more, and a lot of time and money due to another heart operation.
I did what I had always known to do: I wrote and shared my way through it, and I was rewarded again. The dopamine hits came in thick and fast. I was told, again, that I was so brave and such an inspiration. I was rewarded for suffering.
I also gained a lot during 2022, I got on no less than 10 flights for the first time since COVID, started a career that I adore and had worked towards for 5 years, accumulated savings for the first time in my life, and spent time with new and old friends who helped me heal with laughter.
That kind of content didn't go so well. The likes and comments and messages dropped off. The views dropped by more than two-thirds, so I stopped posting. Maybe I don't need it the way I once did. Maybe I am slowly finding my worth elsewhere. Maybe I am learning that I can't hand my worth to others.
Maybe, just maybe, I am learning that I don't have to suffer to connect with people who are suffering.
Every day I get the privilege of working with young people during their darkest days. I hold space, I remind them of their worth, and I do my very best to make sure they feel seen. My boss told me that this work is "in my bones" because it is. I can walk people through darkness because I have known darkness. They don't have to know my trauma to recognise this. They don't have to see my wounds to feel that I have scars.
I will write again when I figure out how to do it without the cost of being a spectacle. I can't protect baby Beth from being cut open and then plastered all over shopping centers to further a cause. But I can protect myself from doing it over and over again.
So please take this as my formal resignation as an inspiration. I am no longer going into the world and taking hits so that I can report them back. That is too high a price to pay for admiration. I have more than proven my resilience, let's pop that badge on my sleeve and move on.
My content may be more boring but my life is so much better.
Smile often
Beth