*This post has been sponsored in compliance with FTC requirements. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

When I was 17, I had one of the most depressing situations of my life… (Beware: it’s a first world problem worth of the infamous meme)

A Look Back at My High School Prom Drama @homelifeabroad #prom #promdress

It was 2003, and I was soon to be graduating high school. Of course, graduation meant a big gala event with families and friends. I don’t know how it’s done elsewhere, but in my school in Bolivia, the class rents a fancy hall and family members all take part in an elegant dinner and dancing.  You are required to have a mother-son or father-daughter ball dance, men come in suits and tuxedos, and the girls come in the fanciest of dresses, all looking glam of course.

So here was my issue: I was chubby and very large chested and I lived in a developing country where most people were not. And that meant that dresses, bras, pants or clothing my size were mostly unavailable to me throughout my whole high school experience. As self-esteem destroying as that was on its own, it was exacerbated by the fact that the graduation event was coming up and I still didn’t have a dress to wear.

Shop to shop we went. I tried on dozens of dresses, none of which actually fit past my chest.  I went to every possible clothing and dress store in the city. I was panicking. I cried, I screamed at my poor, patient mother – as if, blaming her would help. I hated my life and myself in the peak of my teenage angst.

So we made a decision to travel abroad to find and buy my dress. Can you believe the craziness of that idea?! My mom and I actually traveled to another country JUST to buy me a dress? The lady deserves a medal for putting up with me… In Argentina, we found a dress store that caters to gals of all sizes and pow! I found my dress. And below is my picture of that teenage drama coming to an end… (Never mind that it popped open at the actual graduation because it couldn’t handle the size of my chest…)

A Look Back at My High School Prom Drama @homelifeabroad #prom #promdress

My apologies for the horrendous photo quality

Anyway, I was just thinking about it earlier today and I realized that had this happened in 2013, it would be a completely different situation. There are options that just didn’t exist as openly back then… at least, they weren’t options that I or my family knew about.  Today, you can buy prom dresses online easily… just takes a quick search, going through pictures and picking your size. That would have removed my entire stress 10+ years ago and I wouldn’t be left traumatized till today. Just look at the options I could have picked out… I think I could have rocked them.


A Look Back at My High School Prom Drama @homelifeabroad #prom #promdressA Look Back at My High School Prom Drama @homelifeabroad #prom #promdress

Anyway,  as 2014 comes around, I’m curious:

If you look back at a past trauma, how would it turn out differently in the present?