Redefining Beauty: How My Hands Taught Me to Love Myself
- Nov 19
- 3 min read
By Jillian Amodio LMSW
As a mental health provider, I spend a great deal of time encouraging others to practice self-love and gentle acceptance. But the truth is, sometimes I struggle to practice what I preach.
I was born with a congenital limb difference. It runs in my family. I share this trait with my grandmother, mother, sister, and aunt. My fingers are very short as I am missing the third joint in each of my fingers, and my thumbs have only one joint instead of two. I don’t have fingernails, but I do have a thumbnail on each hand.
Growing up, I hated my hands. I felt ugly, different, weird, damaged, and unlovable. These feelings weren’t really about my hands themselves, but rather the messaging I absorbed from others.
Children can be cruel, and many of my peers refused to play with me because they thought I had a “disease” that they would catch if I touched them. Some laughed, pointed, or avoided me altogether. Others made cruel jokes and threatened to chop my fingers off the rest of the way with the sharp paper cutter at the back of the classroom. Even adults reinforced my shame. I once had a middle school teacher who told me she hoped I never had children so I wouldn’t “pass on such a horrible trait.”
Spoiler alert: I have two beautiful children, and neither inherited my hand difference.
Through adolescence and into early adulthood, my relationship with my hands was complicated. Sometimes I felt ashamed, other times indifferent, but rarely proud.
I learned to hide them in photos, ball them into fists, pull my sleeves over them, or keep them folded in my lap. They were my deepest insecurity.
It wasn’t until well into my thirties that I finally began to feel genuine acceptance and even love for my hands. That shift didn’t happen overnight. It came from years of healing, introspection, and growing to understand what true beauty really means.
Now, I love my hands for all that they represent. I love the lineage they connect me to, the women in my family who share this same difference. I love the curiosity they inspire in others, especially children who ask questions without judgment. I love the stories they tell and the lessons they’ve taught me about empathy, resilience, and self-worth.
And on a lighter note... I really love that my manicures cost a fraction of the price when I go with my daughter!
These days, I no longer hide my hands. I celebrate them. I enjoy treating myself to a partial manicure, loving the feel and creative outlet of acrylic nails. I find joy in choosing colorful polishes and expressing myself through the little things that once felt impossible. I even have custom-made winter gloves that fit perfectly, keeping my hands warm and reminding me that beauty and comfort come in all forms.
My journey has certainly been one of transformation and learning to redefine beauty on my own terms. For years, I believed beauty was something external and conventional. But real beauty, I’ve learned, is far deeper than that.
Beauty is kind.
Beauty is gentle.
Beauty is accepting.
Beauty is unique.
Beauty is authentic.
When I finally embraced these truths, everything changed. I stopped striving to meet a definition of beauty that was never meant for me and started embodying my own. My hands, once the source of so much shame, have become a symbol of strength, connection, and love.
That’s what transformational beauty means to me, not changing who you are to fit the world’s idea of perfection, but changing how you see yourself. Because when you can look at what once made you feel “less than” and see only love, that’s the most beautiful transformation of all.
-Jillian Amodio
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