Have you ever heard the saying that people get stuck in the age where they peaked? Like how the quarter back of the high school football team will always mentally be eighteen? As I approach 30 (which is still a few years away, but my fiancé makes it sound like we’re turning 30 tomorrow), I am starting to wonder if I am ever going to grow out of my girlhood.
Girlhood feels like such a big topic to talk about that I don’t think I could really ever cover every aspect of it, but since it’s on my mind, I wanted to talk about it for today’s blog post.
What is Girlhood?
If you were to look up the word “girlhood,” the result that comes from Cambridge Dictionary is, “the period when a person is a girl, and not yet a woman, or the state of being a girl.”
Even though that is a solid definition, I still feel like it’s vague. It doesn’t exactly identify when that transition happens, from being a girl to being a woman. Does it happen when you get your period? When you kiss someone outside of your family for the first time? When you get married?
Maybe I feel stuck in my girlhood because I feel like the bar keeps changing in my mind of when girlhood will be over. I was under the impression that girlhood was over when you got your period, but I just felt like the bleeding version of a girl. Then I thought it would happen when I became a teenager, but that seemed to further highlight my feelings of being in my girlhood. So then I labeled it as when I turned 18, but figuring out young adulthood still feels like girlhood. I turned 21 and felt no different, and then 25 came and I felt like I was having a quarter-life crisis because I still felt like a girl.
Right now, it seems like I might be bleeding girlhood until I turn 30. It makes me think that I might need to watch 13 Going On 30, that Jennifer Garner movie where she wants to be “30 and flirty and thriving.” Or maybe I’m wrong, and girlhood will bleed into that too. Will I feel the shift into womanhood? From the looks of this trailer, it might be all the same.
Olivia Rodrigo Can’t Be Ignored
This has been so prevalent in my mind since Olivia Rodrigo dropped her Netflix special Olivia Rodrigo: GUTS World Tour back in October. This also should be prefaced with the fact that I couldn’t get into her GUTS album when it first came out, because it was a little too rocker for me. I enjoyed “lacy” and “vampire” because I really enjoy her ballads (which is what I enjoyed about SOUR), but the punk-rock sound doesn’t really appeal to me. Combine that with the fact that I have loved Sabrina Carpenter since her Girl Meets World days, and I had no problem not listening to GUTS.
However, since the Netflix special dropped, I have discovered a new appreciation for the album. More specifically, seeing Rodrigo’s artistry as she performed the album resonated so much with where I feel about girlhood. I find that I am letting her Netflix special play all the time in the background, and that GUTS is actually my chosen word of the year for 2025.
That is why I am saying she can’t be ignored. She has found a way to encapsulate many of my feelings of girlhood, and that is something that I have been constantly thinking about and turning in my brain for a few months now. Even if she wasn’t originally for me, she has made a space for herself in my life that I can’t ignore.
40 Songs to Add to Your Girlhood Playlist
Since music seems to be the art that has me delving further into my girlhood, I thought I would share some songs that further encapsulate my feelings about girlhood. I’m sure that this isn’t a full and comprehensive list, this list just manages to encapsulate many of my personal experiences of girlhood.
- “I’m Not a Girl, Not Yet a Woman” by Britney Spears
- “ballad of a homeschooled girl” by Olivia Rodrigo
- “making the bed” by Olivia Rodrigo
- “logical” by Olivia Rodrigo
- “love is embarrassing” by Olivia Rodrigo
- “pretty isn’t pretty” by Olivia Rodrigo
- “all-american bitch” by Olivia Rodrigo
- “girl I’ve always been” by Olivia Rodrigo
- “teenage dream” by Olivia Rodrigo
- “Rumors” by Lindsay Lohan
- “because i liked a boy” by Sabrina Carpenter
- “21” by Gracie Abrams
- “thank u, next” by Ariana Grande
- “breathin” by Ariana Grande
- “yes, and?” by Ariana Grande
- “Reflection” by Fifth Harmony
- “Bigger Person” by Lauren Spencer Smith
- “The Climb” by Miley Cyrus
- “Ordinary Girl” by Hannah Montana
- “Nobody’s Perfect” by Hannah Montana
- “Just Like You” by Hannah Montana
- “Don’t Wanna Be Torn” by Hannah Montana
- “Who Says” by Selena Gomez
- “Lose You To Love Me” by Selena Gomez
- “Tell Me Something I Don’t Know” by Selena Gomez
- “Kill Em With Kindness” by Selena Gomez
- “this is me trying” by Taylor Swift
- “Bejeweled” by Taylor Swift
- “Blank Space (Taylor’s Version)” by Taylor Swift
- “The Man” by Taylor Swift
- “mad woman” by Taylor Swift
- “I Can Do It With a Broken Heart” by Taylor Swift
- “So High School” by Taylor Swift
- “You Are In Love (Taylor’s Version)” by Taylor Swift
- “mirrorball” by Taylor Swift
- “You’re Losing Me (From The Vault)” by Taylor Swift
- “Mean (Taylor’s Version)” by Taylor Swift
- “Mastermind” by Taylor Swift
- “Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve” by Taylor Swift
- “All Too Well (10 Minute Version) (Taylor’s Version)” by Taylor Swift
Does anyone else feel like their age? What does growing up look like for you? What songs embody the golden age of your life? Let me know in the comments below!
As always, thank you for taking the time to read this blog post. If you enjoyed what you read, please let me know by liking this post, commenting your thoughts below, and sharing this with your friends. And of course, you can make my day by subscribing to this blog, which means that you’ll get updates every time I put out more posts like this one.
Love Always,
Kristi My
Kristi My Dao 