The Barbie Dream & The Woman I Became

I couldn’t wait to grow up.

I couldn’t wait to have curves, wear makeup, write checks, drive a fast car, decorate a beautiful home, and live the glamorous life I imagined as a little girl.

And honestly… I blame Barbie.

I had every kind of Barbie imaginable. Every Barbie Dreamhouse, vacation set, convertible, closet, camper, pool, and fantasy world they created. Being an only child for ten years afforded me certain luxuries that made extravagance feel normal to me. What some people viewed as “too much,” I viewed as possibility, imagination, beauty, and escape.

To some people, my love for luxury, beauty, aesthetics, and fantasy may seem excessive or materialistic. But for me, those things have always represented more than objects.

They represent comfort.

Creativity.

Organization.

Goals.

Peace.

Potential.

A future I was trying to build long before I even understood what adulthood truly was.

Since childhood, I’ve always dreamed in grand proportions. Big dreams. Big visions. Big aesthetics. Big emotions.

But somewhere along the way, I learned to shrink myself.

I would close myself into a shell for relationships. Dim my personality. Make myself smaller for men who claimed their needs required more nurturing, more attention, more sacrifice. I was often told I was “too much,” too ambitious, too expressive, too playful, too emotional, too dreamy.

So I scaled back.

Again and again.

But in my current relationship and honestly during this entire season of my life I made a conscious decision to start living toward my goals unapologetically.

Not as someone’s girlfriend.

Not as someone’s support system.

Not as someone constantly minimizing herself to fit into another person’s comfort zone.

But for me.

And maybe that’s why I related so deeply to the Barbie movie.

Because Ken doesn’t really fit into Barbie’s Dreamhouse.

And truthfully… most men probably won’t fit into mine either.

Not because I hate men.

Not because I don’t desire love.

But because I finally understand that my inner world was always built around freedom, imagination, creativity, softness, luxury, and self-expression.

At almost 50 years old, I’m not ashamed of still loving the things that make me feel alive and childlike.

I love makeup.

I love dressing like a mermaid.

I love singing loudly.

I love cosplay.

I love Comic Con.

I love video games.

I love fantasy worlds.

I love glitter, sequins, beautiful furniture, themed aesthetics, and playful self-expression.

There’s a side of me that still deeply loves to play.

And sometimes I wonder…

Do I actually wish I were a child again?

Or do I simply wish to experience childhood freedom as an adult safely, creatively, and on my own terms?

People often misunderstood Michael Jackson for creating Neverland. They saw immaturity, escapism, psychological dysfunction. But maybe part of it wasn’t about refusing to grow up at all.

Maybe it was about trying to preserve wonder in a world that demands constant labor, responsibility, emotional exhaustion, and survival.

Maybe playful adults aren’t broken.

Maybe they’re overstimulated by reality.

Because the truth is, executive functioning as an adult can feel incredibly heavy. Waking up every day to responsibilities, bills, emotional labor, caregiving, survival, deadlines, and consistency can drain the spirit.

So maybe the fantasy worlds, costumes, dolls, makeup, glitter, games, and dreamhouses aren’t signs of immaturity.

Maybe they’re medicine.

Maybe they’re tiny rebellions against a world that tells adults they must abandon imagination in order to be taken seriously.

And honestly?

I don’t want to abandon mine anymore.

I spent too many years shrinking my dreams to fit inside someone else’s limitations.

Now I want to build my dreamhouse exactly the way I imagined it as a little girl beautiful, magical, expressive, creative, luxurious, playful, peaceful, and entirely my own.