Flawless

I took H shopping yesterday. We were on a specific mission, which failed, and yet we still made it worth our while.

She pulled me into Express, which admittedly, I hadn't even been into since pre-kids.  But everything was 40% off, and she wanted me to try things on, so I let her pick out an array of clothes for me to try on since she is becoming quite the fashionista as of late, and dresses me most days at home as it is.

In the dressing room I tried on a few things that we both liked. Then I tried on a cute tee and she squealed, "Oh, I loooove it!"

I made a face, I'm sure. And I said, "Eh, it really emphasizes my round tummy."

H leaned forward from the little bench she was sitting on, placing her hands on my stomach and said, "But I love your round tummy, Mommy."

I smiled, kissed the top of her head, and simply said, "Me too."

There was so much I wanted to tell her in that moment. So much she is too young to know. She's so innocent and naïve, and I love that. She will be bombarded with the ideas of beauty and the woes that come with them soon enough.

I wanted to tell her that I'd been told my whole life not to love my round tummy.

That it had been a point of contention my entire life.

That even when I was a tiny girl her age, skinny all over, I still had a round, distended tummy.

That my older brother and sister had called me "beach ball" for years because of it. I'd cried myself to sleep so many nights, certain that my round tummy was why I'd never be beautiful.

And despite what fashion magazines told me a perfect body looked like, despite all the health and fitness magazines that had "a plan" to get rid of that round, distended tummy, I always secretly loved it.

Yes, the very thing that repulsed most people was a thing of love and beauty to me, long before it ever carried two babes, even.

I wanted in that moment to tell my dear H to love her flaws.

But at the same time, she is flawless. So what's not to love?

There will be things she doesn't love about herself. All ready she has moments where she doesn't love the raised birthmark on the inside of her wrist and tells me she wants it off. For now I just kiss it and tell her it's a beautiful part of what makes her her, and I love it so much.

It's crazy, how ordinary moments and simple little comments can illicit so many emotions and thoughts at once.

H told me she loved my round tummy. And in a split second I felt all the feelings of a little girl told it wasn't loveable, and the immense self-love and rebellion of loving it anyway.

And I truly hope my own girl only ever feels the self-love part. That she never believes any part of her person, physical or otherwise, is unlovable. Because she is perfect.

Flawless.

Like all other girls.