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My Very First Date

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My Very First Date

What we taught little girls.

Shani Silver
Aug 3, 2023
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My Very First Date

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Welcome to Cheaper Than Therapy, a newsletter by Shani Silver. This newsletter does not publish free content, but if you’d like to read it you can subscribe here. Thank you for enjoying the work of independent writers.

I personally don’t think any of us have business dating until we’re old enough to drink and appreciate a good raw bar.

When I was seven, a boy liked me. I was in second grade, he was in first grade. We never associated with each other, he just thought I was pretty. I didn’t like him “that way,” but that part shouldn’t matter. Not when I’m seven. No one had any business liking someone “that way” back then, because it simply wasn’t time yet. I remember being really ashamed that someone had a “crush” on me, and even more ashamed that he was a grade lower. I didn’t want this crush to be happening, I wanted it to stop and go away. I didn’t understand what I’d done wrong to bring it upon me. Can you imagine trying to actually process unwanted romantic advances at seven years old?

I didn’t think about boys yet. But a boy happened to me anyway. My adult self is still angry at the adults around me at the time, for indulging the infatuation of a little boy while throwing the emotional wellbeing of a little girl to wolves. I haven’t thought about this memory in a long time, probably because I wanted to forget it. But forgetting doesn’t help. Understanding what I actually took away from it however, just might.

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