Recognition

Frida Kahlo has been a constant thread through my life — a beacon of influence, defiance, wonder, and truth. Everything about her speaks to my soul — not in a fan-girl way, but in the way of kindred spirits.

I feel like I have always known Frida — as if she’s been with me for as long as I can remember, wild and free and defiant and never quite fitting in. Emotionally, that feels true.
Logically, though?

American curriculum didn’t teach about Frida Kahlo — and let’s be honest, a non-conformist, disabled, bisexual, politically outspoken Mexican woman wasn’t exactly going to make the cut. Education systems are far more interested in producing obedient citizens than free thinkers.

Realistically, I must have learned about her for the first time through the biopic in 2002. Which means I was already a mother to two girls. Already deep in the thick of adulthood. Already struggling through marriage, responsibility, survival. Building a career. Holding a household together — all without ever having figured out who I was before I became everything to everyone else.

And yet… it still felt like I’d known her all my life.

I never quite fit in. Anywhere.

From early on, I seemed to move through the world differently — less afraid of consequence, more willing to take risks, instinctively resistant to control. I didn’t experience rules as safety; I experienced them as something to be negotiated, tested, sometimes ignored.

I wasn’t reckless.
I was resolute.

Even as that wildness softened with age — as it had to — it never disappeared. It went inward. Became quieter. More contained. Less understood. I struggled to exist without betraying myself, even when I couldn’t yet explain who that self was.

There’s an ancient archetype — the wild woman. She knows she’s different. She knows her life will be harder because she cannot abandon herself to belong. And she recognises others like her — across time and distance — without needing an introduction.

I think that’s how I “knew” Frida before I knew her.

When I finally encountered her properly — her face, her art, her refusal to shrink — it wasn’t discovery. It was recognition. She gave language to something I had always lived, but never articulated.

That recognition didn’t stay internal. It found its way into how I present myself to the world.

When you look at both of my websites — this one and Winning the Fight — you’ll notice the similarities immediately. Both are pink. Both use the same layout, the same fonts, the same tone and voice. And both quote Frida Kahlo.

The pink is intentional. It speaks to femininity, love, nurturing, softness, beauty — and yes, breast cancer. It’s a colour I didn’t always connect with, but as I become more myself, it feels inevitable. And the Frida quotes? They’re not decorative. They’re foundational.

That’s the gift Frida gave me — not courage, but context.

She didn’t make me wild.
She didn’t teach me defiance.
She didn’t turn me into something new.

She didn’t change who I was. She showed me that what I already was… was allowed.

This is part 1 of a series on Frida Kahlo — not as an icon, but as recognition.