Imperfection

(I wrote this a while back, but never had the guts to post. I'm feeling bold today.)

My friend's Facebook status said: "I keep thinking of the little girl in the mall whose dad told her that her body was just not made right to fit into any of the clothes."

This is not a story about eating disorders. It's about imperfect parents.

Everyone who commented was furious at the father:

“Makes me sick.”

“So sad and so hurtful for her.....possibly for many years to come.”

“You need a driver’s license for a car, library card for books, but humans can just have babies willy-nilly.”

I know I'm supposed to feel bad for the girl, and I do, but it's the reactions to the dad that keep going over in my mind. They sound like the things strangers say when I go shopping.

A couples years ago, I was at the grocery store with my daughter and son, then 6 and 9. This is not as mundane a task as it sounds; my son’s behaviour is unpredictable: he was diagnosed at 5 with attention deficit issues and at 6 with an autism disorder. My daughter: same deals at 7.

I let my kids use the mini “shopper in training” carts. Grab bread, bananas, baloney, and milk without clipping any old ladies’ heels – check. Make it to the checkout without any tantrums, casualties, or open candy wrappers - check. Keep the kids busy returning the shopper in training carts while I waited in line to pay – bad idea. My 9-year-old began ramming his cart into the row of carts, repeatedly, in rhythm. Autistic children love rhythm. Sandwiched between two older shoppers of considerable girth and their matching purses, I was going nowhere fast. I was about to squeak “Excuse me” and squeeze around them when I heard the woman in the next aisle.

“People need to learn how to control their children! Some people should think twice before having kids of their own.”

As the rest of her grocery line debates the best punishment for my son, I debate my next move. I can’t get to him without making a big show of it. Should I take his hand, walk up to Superstore Nanny and make a speech about mature human beings respecting those with invisible disabilities? Or should I take both my children and walk out with all my dignity and no baloney?

I chicken out. I wait till the shopper in front of me and the panel of judges in the next aisle leave the store before retrieving my son from his game of musical carts.

I imagine that the dad is shopping with his daughter because he recently lost his wife, or perhaps she's just away for the weekend and he had high hopes for a bonding night with his little princess. Hours of frustration over not being able to find her size (or perhaps any size he can afford) lead him to blurt, "None of these clothes are made right for your body!" But in his fatigue, he says it backwards. And too loudly. And everyone stares. I may be wrong, but I can imagine he felt like I did when my daughter was scared to use the washroom at Disney and I slammed the stall door and growled in the happiest restroom on earth.

I'm going to go to sleep for a hundred million years, so I never have to pee here again.

When my son was a toddler, long before we knew he’d have “letters” (ADHD, PDD-NOS, SOS) behind his name I would crawl into his room after he was asleep, kneel beside his crib and whisper, “I'm so sorry.” Sorry for grabbing your arm too tightly so you wouldn’t run away at Walmart. Sorry for yelling at you when you did run away at Walmart by sneaking under the change room door, and I had to chase you through the men’s department with my fly open. Sorry for falling asleep in front of Blue's Clues while you climbed the TV with a pair of scissors in one hand and a bottle of Advil in the other. 

Sorry for forgetting how beautiful your eyelashes look when you sleep.

Perhaps I’m not as triggered by the dad’s statement because, despite the fact that my dad told me repeated that I’d inherited his super-sized nose and my mom’s bottom, I never fixated on my body (even when I passed my mom’s size by seventh Grade). I can see how hurtful words about looks could lead some in that direction, but I got caught in the web of another kind of words: rejection of my personality. Rejection that still hurts when it comes from other parents, shoppers, and Facebook.

Me dressed up for a day of errands with the kids, complete with soundproof helmet, padded knees to absorb the impact of my kids' shopping carts, and oxygen should I begin to hyperventilate. 

No, you don't need a license or card to be parent, but every licensed driver occasionally cuts someone off, every library cardholder sometimes returns books late, and every parent says things they regret. You don't get to say "I'm too overtired, sick, or overwhelmed to parent you today." You have to take care of them 24 hours a day, no matter how you feel, and sometimes you just don't do it well. On those days you tell them you're sorry, pray for forgiveness, and hope the good things you say are the ones that stick.