Sarah says, "I wish everyone liked the way they looked without wanting to change themselves."
A flash essay on faces and beauty + a video from Sarah
This flash essay is part of my May monthly theme on the body. Today I share with you a short reflection on raising a daughter with a different face and how I return to the question of why most of us are obsessed with external beauty, or even what beauty means. I don’t delve into that philosophy here, because my assumption is that both you and I can agree that “beauty is in the eye of the beholder,” as the old trope goes. The Children’s Craniofacial Association, which provides resources and support to families who have kids with various craniofacial diagnoses (some of which are listed in this piece), has a motto that summarizes what I am trying to say here: “Beyond the face is a heart.”
On March 16, 2025, Sarah turned twelve. She selected a fancy outfit to wear for the occasion—a light pink dress with a tulle skirt and sparkly, beaded bodice with ruffle sleeves—and asked me to fix her hair in a pretty style. We completed the ensemble with a dab of pink lip gloss and Sarah’s favorite Minnie Mouse necklace.
As I snapped her photo in our family room, Joey whirred past us. He stopped, took a few steps back, gasped, and said, “Sarah, you look exactly like a princess!” (Sarah’s name means princess in Hebrew.) She beamed.
I think of how natural it is for my kids to see who Sarah truly is, beyond her face. I think of their sincere affirmations of her beauty, of how they can see what most people cannot: beauty is a matter of how a person lives in the world rather than their exterior appearance.
We still get this wrong as a society. Right now I’m remembering when Ben and I traveled with Sarah to Orange County, California in 2015 for a craniofacial family conference. She was a little over two years old then. What struck me was the odd juxtaposition of people with Apert syndrome and Treacher-Collins and Pfeiffer and Crouzon’s milling in clusters through a mall that included walk-in Botox centers.
We’re not as evolved as we believe we are.
Often, I look at my aging face and body with disdain: laugh lines, patches of grey hair along my temples, and hormonal, perimenopausal acne cropping along my chin and cheeks. Sarah asks me why people get plastic surgery, why they would want to change their faces, and I don’t have a good answer, except, “They don’t like how they look.”
She scrunches her nose, tucks her chin, and frowns. “Well, I like the way I look,” she tells me proudly, and I nod. “I wish everyone else liked the way they looked, too, without wanting to change themselves.”
I want to tell her this is what I wish, too, but I know I am far from accepting my own changing appearance. I want to learn to love myself the way Sarah does, to see myself the way Sarah views herself: unpretentiously, honestly, humbly. I want to model for her and all my daughters that beauty is not contained in expensive creams and elixirs. I want them to look in the mirror and notice the kindness reflected in the way their eyes crinkle when they smile, how the color of their irises brighten when they’re happy.
Maybe I won’t get to a solid place of embracing every aspect of myself. Maybe that’s not the point. But wouldn’t it be something if I decided that love begins by saying, I may not fit the beauty standard, but I like the way I look and don’t want to change anything about who I am.
Sarah wanted to share with our “Substack friends” her thoughts on plastic surgery. We chat about the invasive mid-face advancement surgery that she will have when she’s a late teen (after orthodontic and oral work is complete). Her takeaway: “I want everyone to like the way they look.”
I want you to know how deeply I value you taking the time out of your hectic schedule to pause and read this today. It means a great deal that you stopped by, and I do my best to respond to every person who comments on my posts and Notes, because I want each of you to know you matter to me and my family, especially to Sarah. Because I spend a large chunk of my week doing carework for Sarah’s complex medical needs, your financial contribution helps offset the unpaid time I spend doing administrative work, advocacy, and coordination of care. Thank you for whatever you are able to give.
My daughter needed Sarah's courage today. She took a fall over the weekend and has road rash on her eye and chin. Given her father's facial trauma following his motorcycle accident, this is significant for her, and it was difficult for her to go to school today. Her wounds will heal, but that feeling of being different, other, stared at, judged, I don't think that leaves us. It is one of the reasons I am so drawn to Sarah's vulnerable honesty about her own face, and how her perception of her own beauty starts with kindness to herself. Now, there is something to learn.
Sarah is changing the world with her wisdom and kindness. Thank you Sarah!!!!! Adolescence was harrowing for me because of our culture's obsession with homogonous beauty. Imagine a world where we could embrace all of the different kinds of stunning beauty that exist, much like Mama Earth does. Sarah, we need you! We love you!