...when you love someone, you love the whole person, just as he or she is, and not as you would like them to be. ~ Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina

In honor of Mother's Day next week, I've decided to pen a letter to my mother, darling mommie dearest, to thank her for everything she's done for me...

Dear Mother, 

I say “mother” and not “mom” for many reasons. When I think of you, I think “mommie dearest,” strictly an authority figure, a dictator, an abuser. Do you even know what makes a good mom? Or what the difference is between a dictator and a mom? Can you differentiate? I’ll lay it out for you.

I want to thank you, mother, for teaching me how to never treat other people. We learn by example, right? My whole life, you treated me like I couldn’t do anything right. Nothing was good enough for you, no matter how hard I worked my ass off for your approval. I don’t remember ever hearing you say “I’m proud of you,” or “I love you,” just because, or for doing something however remarkable or ordinary.

Thank you, for convincing me I was a shitty kid and a terrible human being, just for thinking for myself and being the independent woman you told me I needed to be. 

Thank you for never listening to what I had to say with all sincerity and turning every conversation into how bad I made you feel. Or for not hearing me when I told you something hurt me, or made me upset, but only ever criticizing and telling me that it wasn’t ok to cry, that it wasn’t ok to be upset or get angry, that it wasn’t ok to feel.

Me and my mother, circa. 1987

Thank you, for bragging about me to the neighbors, to the people at church, to everyone but me. You’d tell them how proud you were of me, or are, but to me, you’d make me feel like I was doing something as awful as working street corners, dealing drugs, having a baby daddy or two, or coming home in the back of cop cars.

Thank you for taking credit for every single one of my accomplishments. You kicked me out of the house right after I turned 21 with barely a penny to my name. You gave me absolutely no financial help after I left. I'm the one who put a roof over my head, who fed me, clothed me. I bought myself a new car when the old one died, the one who paid for the repairs and insurance and gas. I'm the one who put myself through grad school, the thing you definitely can't take credit for since you were the one trying to convince me not to go back to school. But obviously once I was there it was because of your good parenting and not the fact that I worked my ass off in spite of you to do it.

Thank you, for making me believe that if you died tomorrow, I wouldn’t feel anything.

Now I’m going rewind a bit to tell you all the things you did throughout the years that you thought were helpful, but fucked me up more than you know...

Each time you went on a diet, which was throughout all of my childhood, into my early adulthood, and probably even now, you taught me that women can never and should never be comfortable in their skin. Everytime you didn’t allow me dessert even after I finished all of my peas, or didn’t let me have seconds after a really grueling swim practice and I was really, honestly, still hungry, and told me that I needed to stay little and thin and not gain too much weight, you taught me that to be beautiful meant to be hungry. To be beautiful meant to be skinny. Mental and physical health didn't matter, but what you look like does.

That being said, it shouldn’t have been that much of a surprise when I became anorexic and bulimic. But it was fine, right? I was thin. So I was beautiful. I was your thin, beautiful daughter. You should have loved me because this is what you taught me to be. You should have seen that I did that for you. I did that because I could control what I put in my body in a way I couldn’t control our relationship or how you treated me. I starved and made myself weak because you wanted me to be beautiful. I was constantly hungry. Hungry for attention. Hungry for affection. Hungry for a mother’s love that would never be reciprocated. Hungry for my failure of a mother. 

Me, my mother, and my sister, circa. 1991

But I thought I was the failure. I thought I failed when I had to give in and start eating again because I was about to pass out. I thought I failed when I started putting weight back on, something that you told me I shouldn’t be doing (“Hey, honey, you’re porking up a little there. Maybe you should go for a run before dinner or maybe after dinner…”) I needed to be punished. I failed. I couldn’t as thin or as beautiful as you wanted me to be. I was a bad daughter.

I have the scars on my arms for everytime I was bad. For everytime I felt I needed to be punished because I couldn’t live up to the ideals of the daughter you thought I was supposed to be. Ironically, one night, in a manic state, the word “HELP” ended up carved into my left forearm. Even in a place I don’t remember too clearly, I was screaming for help. Love. Attention. The first line of the “H” and the vertical line of the “L” are all that remain as evidence, but the scars are telling and still burn everytime I look at them, no matter how faded they are now. I’d be embarrassed when people asked me what they were from. But how do you tell people that your mother hated herself enough and took her insecurities out on you enough for you to hate yourself so much that you started taking razor blades to your arms and other parts of your body?

And now we move on to some of the things I did that you didn’t understand or attempt to understand. Some I did just to piss you off, but others just begged for attention and understanding, maybe even acceptance.

Each time I dyed my hair, you hated it. You told me so. I’ve been every color but blonde. I loved it. It was reinventing myself because the self I was wasn’t good enough for you and in turn wasn’t good enough for me. And ok, I get why you were pissed about the neon blue, in hindsight, that wasn’t the brightest color choice (especially when it turned grey after wash number three). But you should have been pissed at yourself. You should have thought about what would have possessed your eldest daughter to change her hair color less than once a month? To grow it out to extreme lengths. To chop it all off and sometimes hacking it off unevenly with razorblades. But you never thought about these things. You only thought about how I made you look to other people. To the other moms on the pool deck or on the softball field. To the people at church. I was a bad kid because I dyed my hair. I dyed my hair because you were a bad mother.

When I was old enough to do things (legally) without your signature, I pierced my ears. Many times. I lost track. Maybe twelve holes total in each ear. I pierced my nose. I pierced my navel. I got a tattoo. And another. And another. They were of things that meant something to me. You wouldn’t know this though. You never asked why I wanted that particular Bible verse tattooed on my wrist (it reminds me that God is there under the worst affliction, including that of your family). Or the cross on my back. Or the Chinese symbols saying “faith” on my hip. You never cared why those things meant anything to me. That was all I had to hold on to. My faith. Sometimes though, I really hated God for giving me a mother like you. No, you never asked "why?" You yelled at me for “defiling” my body. “What will the people at church think? My tattooed daughter?” You would spew the word “tattoo” like it was AIDS or another horrible disease. You got pissed for each piercing I came home with. I took joy in each time you got mad. You punished me for years for no reason at all, so it was only a happy coincidence that the things I did to express myself also punished you. 

Me, my mother, and my sister, circa. 1992

That was nothing compared to the night I was raped. I needed my mom. I needed hugs. I needed help. But I couldn’t tell you. I couldn’t risk being criticized. I bawled. I scrubbed my skin raw. You weren’t there. You couldn’t know. You wouldn't give a flying fuck. I went to Planned Parenthood to make sure I got tested. I went to one hundreds of miles from home when I was at school so you wouldn’t know. So I wouldn't have to hear once again how much of a failure I was. 

When I finally did tell you, six months later, it was because you were mad I was staying out all night and not coming home. I was 20. I let you know where I was going to be, and almost everytime I was just with friends doing nothing special. I stayed out because I didn’t want to be around you. You're the one who drove me away from the house. I had no real desire to party, experiment with drugs, etc., but you wouldn’t know that would you? You accused me of wanting to just fuck boys and of being a slut and a whore. I told you that I lost my virginity a few months ago by being raped. You told me that if I hadn’t been a disobedient, horrible brat it never would have happened and that it was my own damn fault. I told you that you were a bitch and I hoped you died. 

I could go on for years about every single little influence you've had over my life. But the bottom line here is that maybe I do, in actuality, owe absolutely everything I am and have become to you:

I know how to stand alone and how to take care of myself because you were nowhere to be found when I needed you. 

I'm independent and outspoken because I got tired of having you walk all over me and I refused to let anyone else use me as a doormat. 

I know how to work hard for what I want and for the things that matter because I know I'm the only person who can make those happen since you never had my back or gave me any form of support, emotional, financial, or otherwise. 

circa. 1989

I know how to not treat other people, even those who aren't family, because I refuse to make anyone feel as worthless as you've made me feel. No one deserves that. Not even you.

I know how to love, because everything I ever wanted from you and everything I ever wanted to give to you is overflowing onto the people I do have in my life who have been there for me through the years and who have created the family I always wanted to have with you. I love because you could never love me.

I know that when I say "I love you" it really means something. Growing up, that phrase was only ever just words. Now in my late twenties, I've seen love. I've experienced it. I've seen it in action. I know that sometimes "I love you" is saying absolutely nothing at all. 

I know that I will only ever tell my future daughter how beautiful she is, because she's flawless, because she's my daughter, because I love her, and because I never ever want her to think of her body as anything but perfect. Why? It's hers. It's healthy. Because she's fucking beautiful and alive. Because her worth and her self-esteem should never be tied to the number on the scale or on the tags of her clothes. Because she is worth ever so much more than I can describe with words.

So thank you, mother. Thank you for teaching me what kind of person I never want to be and for helping me become everything you're not. 

Happy Mother's Day. 

Tell her she's beautiful

1991

I'm almost five years old. It's Easter Sunday and I finally get to wear that pink frilly dress with the baby blue sash that's been hanging in my closet for months. I haven't been allowed to wear it or even touch it. Until now.

I climb on a chair to get it out of my closet and practically rip it off the hanger in my excitement. I pull it up (because why would I pull the dress over my head?) and get my arms in the sleeves before running down the hall to have Mom zip it.

As the zipper goes up, I hear a heartbreaking riiiiiiiip followed by an even more heartbreaking, "It doesn't fit anymore. You'll have to wear something else." And if it's possible, that's followed by an even more disastrous, "You got too chubby, we're going to have to put you on a diet. No more snacks."

Cue tears.

1997

I'm two months shy of being 11. Swimming was the only thing I had in my life at that point that I felt I was remotely good at. I practiced about five days a week and had meets on weekends. The pool was my world where I felt at home and flip flops, shorts, and Speedos, while not entirely comfortable, were my clothing of choice. I go through a growth spurt of about three inches and gain roughly ten pounds. That's a hard adjustment for any kid in and of itself.

But then it gets worse: I get my period for the first time and my body is doing all sorts of weird shit that no one felt it necessary to explain to me beforehand. I feel fat, gross, confused, hormonal, and vulnerable. I'm bleeding, feel like I'm dying, and just need a little reassurance that A) this is totally normal, and B) I'm pretty and beautiful and I don't look as gross and fat as I feel.

"Mom, what's wrong with  me? I feel fat and yucky."

"Yeah it's normal, deal with it."

"But Mom, I got fat."

"Well go for a run and don't eat as much."

Shit. Good call, Ma.

2003

I'm almost 17 years old. I just finished high school and am about to leave for college. I weigh 85-90 pounds and for a girl who has always done sports and has been pretty muscular, I'm too damn small. My clothes are all too big and nothing fits correctly and I'd rather stay in the house and never leave than bother to get prettied up and go out with friends. Nothing I wear is ever right and my hair is never in place.

"You can't leave the house like that."

"Why not?"

"That skirt is too short and the top is too tight and too low. You look fat and slutty."

"Ma, the shirt is too big and the skirt is at my knees."

"Whatever, you're not going out like that. And your hair is all frizzy and you really need to stop slouching."

"I'm not slouching."

"You should probably put some makeup on too. You look washed out and far too Asian without eyeliner (What. The. FUCK?!)."

Fantastic.

I'm not pretty

From the time I was small to now, my parents have never told me I was pretty. Or beautiful. Or anything similar to that. You may think it's an exaggeration, but it's true. My hair was always too short, too long, too frizzy, too flat. I was always too fat, too thin, lacking boobs and any sort of ass. My clothes were always too short, too tight, too revealing, too slutty. I either didn't have enough makeup on and looked like a plain Jane, or too much and looked like a common streetwalker.

I always envied my friends growing up who had adults in their lives, moms and dads, aunts and uncles, grandparents, who would tell them they were pretty. There was always something wrong with the way I looked and always something that could be better. I was never ok just being the way I was. My parents didn't allow it. My mother said she didn't like that I was growing up in a culture that rewarded mediocrity. Sure, that's fine. I get it. Let's not reward complacency. But giving your daughter (and sons) a healthy self-esteem is crucial so they don't constantly compare themselves to others and wish they looked different or were someone different than they were born to be. I hated going clothes shopping. Specifically with my mother. I never wore clothes that fit correctly until I left for college and even then not really until I hit about 20-21. From swimming for the longest time my shoulders were always massive but my body was always a small or extra-small (imagine Michael Phelps' body, but on a five-foot-tall girl). However, my mother would get me clothes that were at least two sizes too big and God forbid I show that I have any sort of shape under the baggy clothes. 

Even now going clothes shopping I get anxious, feeling my mother staring over my shoulder when I try clothes on in the dressing room. Reason #1 I usually order my clothes online...Now, looking back, I feel as though my mother, who has always been overweight her entire life, felt the need to de-prettify me in order to feel not so shitty about herself. Like she couldn't have a daughter who was more confident or prettier than she was/is. I'm not saying I am either of those things, but it was almost as though I needed to be torn down to complete shreds until I had absolutely no self-esteem left in order for her to feel good about herself.

A +++ on the parenting skills, mother.

If you can't beat them... 

Thankfully for me, we live in a society where I have the resources to shape my image into what everyone else expected me to be or what I could be. So obviously I did the complete opposite. I started dying my hair all sorts of random colors and I think it's been every color imaginable, except blonde (go figure). At one point I had 15 piercings (I'm currently down to nine), and I started getting tattoos the second I turned 18, of which I now have four. Was it rebellion? Maybe. If I was constantly going to be told that there was something wrong with me, I might as well make there be something legitimately and socially wrong with me so that they'd have something to bitch about. I went through the goth stage, the prep stage, the I-don't-give-a-fuck stage, the fashionista stage.

I hid under these "images" so I wouldn't have to admit how broken I was. All I wanted was for someone to call me pretty. During this stage, from probably 16-21, I started expermenting with other things as well. From self-mutilation (which I've mentioned in previous posts), to drugs, to some pretty heavy binge drinking which resulted in a hospital visit, a stomach pumping, and alcohol poisoning. I did what I wanted, when I wanted, and just didn't care. I was cool. I fit in. And until the puking and hangover started I felt like I was in control and felt temporarily good about myself. The temporary high of feeling like I was somebody. Somebody worthy of being loved and being told they were worth something.

All the wrong places

Boys. Boys are always trouble no matter how you look at it. However, combine an emotionally unstable girl who is looking for approval no matter the source and little boys who think they're men, the result is disastrous. The first boy to tell me he thought I was pretty...look out! I was on cloud nine. Life was perfect. Things were great. It didn't matter who it was, he thought I was pretty. I had some sort of worth to somebody. Because I just wanted to be loved and wanted to be told I was beautiful and to feel good about myself, I let my guard down too many times for too many of the wrong people. This made me feel even more ugly than I did to begin with. I was miserable and my self-esteem would be on this constant roller coaster. I sometimes felt like I was on that spinny ride that makes you feel like you're in a washing machine: it's fun at first but when it's over, all you want to do is puke, but you're dumb enough to get back on.

Oh I had friends throughout the years who would tell me I was pretty, and after a point, I knew in my head that by society's standards and perhaps asthetic standards, I was "pretty" and maybe even "beautiful." But hearing it, knowing it, feeling it, and believing it, are all very different things, and not things that necessarily go hand in hand.

I'm beautiful

Over the years, I've gone out of my way to make sure all the other girls and young women (and even older women) in my life are told they're beautiful. Who knows? Maybe they don't often or never hear it at home. I know I sure as hell didn't. Because of this, I developed an early case of anorexia, for a few years coupled with bulimia, that still lingers over me today. While by medical standards I'm a "recovered anorexic," I will always consider myself to be "recovering." Present tense. Not past. That sort of mental and emotional damage just doesn't go away. You don't just "recover" from a mindset that is drilled into you from such a young age. You don't just "get over" being told you're imperfect and unpretty. It takes a longass fucking time. You have to consciously re-teach and re-train yourself to think of yourself as beautiful and constantly remind yourself that you are the way you're supposed to be and nothing more or less.

To this day, I prefer to not wear form-fitting clothing. I don't always feel like I look good, and am super self-conscious and uncomfortable the entire time I'm wearing the clothing in question. Give me some sweats, yoga pants, jeans, T shirts, tanks, and zip up hoodies, and I'm a happy camper. If I can get away without putting makeup on, you'll be damned sure I'm going to do so. I've gotten to a point in my life where I'm way over the fashion and fads and the dos and don'ts of what I'm supposed to look like, wear, and be. Don't get me wrong, I still battle constant insecurities and have many days where I feel like I'm not good enough and I'm not living up to some imaginary standard that, often, only exists in my head. But overall, I'm comfortable in who I am and the woman I've grown into and I know that regardless of the hair day I'm having or whether I'm feeling bloated or thin, I am beautiful because I'm beautiful inside out, not the other way around.

So please, please, PLEASE, PLEASE, tell her she's pretty. Tell your daughter, your sister,  your niece, your cousin. Make sure they know that all bodies and all shapes and all sizes and all ethnicities are beautiful. Leave them a note on their car, in their locker, on the bathroom mirror. Tell them in a phone call, a text, a Facebook message, an email. Best of all, tell them to their face. Let them know you think they're worth something. Let them know you think they're pretty. Let them know they're beautiful.

This world is fucking beautiful because of the people in it. Make sure you let them know.