what it's like to be the 'ugly' friend
oh god. we’re doing this.
This was originally a piece that went out to our paid supporters, but something made me re-read it last night and I wanted you all to have it 𓆩♡𓆪
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what it's like to be the 'ugly' friend
The other day I was scrolling through the questions you’d submitted for me to answer and saw one that made me take a sharp inhale - like I’d just dived head-first into an ice bath. Turns out it wasn’t an ice bath I was diving into, just my entire high school experience. Considering I’m past all that, and a bit braver now, I wanted to answer it for you today.
"Really outing myself here but I feel like I’m the 'ugly' friend in my group. Most of the time, I’m fine with it, but there are times that it really brings me down. I’m not sure if you’ll have any advice (since honestly you seem really cute??), but I thought I’d ask anyway."
Oh god. We’re doing this.
This question made me want to cry because I feel it in my bones. First of all, you’re not ugly. I want to make that clear right now, before I say anything else. But I do know this feeling, and I know it well.
I grew up alongside the literal most beautiful women in the world, who sparkle both in all those conventionally beautiful ways, but also in all their own extraordinary kindness and gentleness. Like, not only are they physically the most beautiful women I’ve ever known, they’re also the GREATEST people alive. It’s not fair and I am so lucky that they’re mine.
Anyway, they’ll hate me for saying this but they also won’t be able to disagree because this is MY newsy, not theirs, but I am not conventionally beautiful. I’m not saying this to be a ‘pick me,’ and also if you know me, you’ll know that now, at the ripe age of 27, I really wouldn’t change a thing about who I am, but growing up surrounded by such obvious beauty was hard. I can’t lie. It was like every time I looked around at my friends sharing clothes or getting texts from boys, or being sent flowers from ‘secret admirers’ on Valentine’s Day it made me want to crawl into a hole in the wall and never come back out, or grab a pair of scissors and cut off all my excess.
When I was in my final year of high school (a famously bad year for me) I organised a sleepover in the school hall for our entire year group. Before we went to sleep we watched a movie, and the one we ended up picking was ‘The Duff.’ I had actively avoided this movie because in my head all I could picture was everyone suddenly putting two and two together that The Duff (Designated Ugly Fat Friend) was me. But I couldn’t argue with the consensus, so we watched it. I can’t even remember the film because I probably spent the whole time checking if people were looking at me and ‘figuring out’ that I was the Duff.
That’s what your brain does when you grow up surrounded by beauty, yet you’re not beautiful. It makes you narcissistic - like everyone’s looking at you and thinking about you and all that you’re not. And when your brain gets like this, that means it’s time to take Jemima Kirke’s advice and stop thinking about yourself so much.
Ok, enough about me, you are here for advice, so let me give you some! I want you to try your best to start believing that you are so much more than how you look. Your brilliance does not only exist when it is validated by others. It (cringe) literally comes from within you.
I also want to note that none of your feelings are your fault! We are either brought up resting our worth on male validation (which is totally fucked), or on whether we’re hot enough to go viral as an influencer or look good in Glossier’s no make-up make-up.
Mostly I want to guarantee you that no one considers you the ugly friend, and it would make your friends hurt so badly to know that you think of yourself that way, so please, don’t change yourself because of the way you’re feeling right now. It will pass. How about instead of focussing on what you’re not, focusing on what you are? The incredibly good friend, chef, artist, deep thinker, advice giver, sister? Think about whatever it is that makes you proud to be alive and lean into that.
Lastly, I’m going to humbly ask you to remember that when you die, no one is going to eulogise you for how perfect your hair was, or how tight of an ass you had.
Phew, LOVE YOU.
Luce xxxx
(P.S I write about this feeling in SO MUCH detail in our book Make It Make Sense, so if you like this type of punch-in-the-gut writing, you should grab a copy?)
I was always the DUFF in my group. I’m overweight, awkward, a know-it-all, etc. My friends (and my sister) are literal model-level beauties. As a teen, and in my twenties and early thirties, that was super hard, but I did a good job of focusing on my strengths and developing a sense of worth outside my beauty.
And now I am 42. And my beautiful friends (who also have many other wonderful qualities), while still beautiful for women in their 40s, are coping with the fact that our society is awful to older women. And it’s not going great for them, because their beauty was a part of them that provided a lot of benefits that they hadn’t realized they were getting. And now that they’re buying all their own drinks and not getting upgraded at the airline counter, they’re going through the same kind of existential questioning that I did at 23.
Society as it is now venerates *youthful* beauty…but youth doesn’t last forever. Having to deal with not being conventionally beautiful as a young person means that I am not dealing with that *now,* and I am so glad not to be. One of the worst things I ever heard was a friend saying “But being hot is all I had!” *I* know that isn’t true, but it took a lot of convincing that there is Life After Hotness.
15 years removed from my high school days, I find myself looking back on photos of myself during that time and thinking - "Damn, I was hot! Look how skinny and pretty I was!" Knowing that at that time, that was the absolute opposite of what I was feeling. My body now has been ravaged by 16+ surgeries with too many scars to count. I try to give myself grace and love and appreciate my body for still being here through everything.
I think about how I'll feel in another 10-15+ years looking back on photos of myself during this time, and how I'll likely be saying the same thing - "Damn, I looked so young and youthful then!" etc. Why do I have to wait until that decade of my life has passed before I can see myself in that way?