Before I turned seventy this year, I hacked off all my hair in a fit of frustration and anger.

Not at my hair, but at my place in the world, my loss of power in it and the simple fact that I did not want to be seventy. I looked in the mirror, scissors in hand, and just hacked away angrily and impulsively, rebelling at the narrative that I was too old to be worthwhile. It was the pixie I’d always wanted, except, not surprisingly, it was uneven and I’d cut down to the scalp in places, leaving ugly bald spots. It would have looked better if I’d gone to a salon, but that would have missed the point of the exercise.

For most of my life, I’d relied on two things to move through the world: my mind and my beauty. Both had worked. I graduated from Yale, which earned me credibility long after the diploma should have stopped mattering. And for decades I was stunning. I don’t say that with vanity, I say it as a fact. People stared so often it became background noise.

People mistook me for my daughter’s sister well into my forties. I took good care of myself. Daily workouts, anti-aging rituals, and a magician of a cosmetic dermatologist. The steps certain types of women perform to stay visible in a culture that rewards youth as virtue.

I knew there was an end to it all, but like death, I never really thought about it coming for me.

A few years ago, though, the shine began to fade. As these things happen, despite my best efforts, one day people simply stopped looking. It wasn’t just a bad hair day. I had crossed the line into invisibility.

What devastated me wasn’t just the loss of beauty, but the loss of capital that came with it. The subtle kindnesses. People wanting to please a complete stranger because her appearance pleased them. I didn’t know how much I’d relied on those unearned dividends until they vanished. There is a particular loneliness in no longer being seen.

At the same time, my mind, my other armor, began to slip a little. Nothing dramatic. No diagnosis. Just the soft dulling that comes with age. I’d always been sharp as a whip, the one who almost always had the right answer, caught the flaws, understood things quickly. So when I started feeling I just wasn’t as smart, it scared me. I knew I was still smart, but I wasn’t the sharpest guy in the room anymore. Losing beauty was one thing. Losing intellect was another. That felt like losing myself.

These unearned gifts of nature set me apart, protected me, and gave me a leg up. Looking back, they were also a straitjacket. Forced into being a certain way lest you be lesser or even cast aside. Forced to see myself in a certain way as critical to my self-worth. Buying into the cultural narrative.

Yet, there is a strange kind of freedom in losing the superficial aspects I let define me. It’s a whole lot easier not needing to get every answer right or easily simplifying complex issues. I accept that I cannot maintain the illusion of effortless youth.

I’ve spent a lifetime navigating a society that rewards accidents of birth. You know, the good genes, the right bone structure, the quick mind. Now, stripped of those advantages, I’m left trying to see myself without the crutches that shaped my life for so long. In the quiet that follows, the questions get louder. Who the hell am I?

When the shine faded and the world stopped looking, I am finally forced to look at myself and acknowledge how easily I allowed myself to be defined in accordance with cultural norms when they benefitted me. But now that they don’t, I’m doing what I probably should have done in the first place: refusing to accept them.

I will find the girl I once was, the authentic me. The tomboy who flouted cultural norms for girls. The girl who was valued simply for existing, long before she needed to be exceptional. The girl who didn’t realize that some people were unfairly valued more than others.

Aging exposes how narrowly we’ve defined worth, especially for women. When the shine fades, what’s left isn’t emptiness, but reckoning. And whether we look away or meet it head- on determines who we become.

Jade Parker reflects on life, truth, and the ongoing pursuit of meaning.