Let's Eat Cake!

I went out on my aunt’s boat this weekend, and someone said one of those traumatizing comments that stay with you forever.  We’ve all got ‘em, especially women.  That one thing some asshole said, either to hurt you or because they were too stupid to know better, but it becomes something you carry with you always.

It had been years since one of those comments happened (3 years, to be exact), and at first I tried to blow it off, but within seconds I was a cowering mess who wanted to run into the house and put a dress on, anything to cover myself up.

Seemingly harmless, it was a 5-year-old little girl that did me in.  I’m walking around in my bikini, showing off my new tan, not really thinking much about how I really look in said bikini (sometimes we have blinders on, yeah?), when the little angel looks at me and says (very loudly), “What happened to your stomach!?”

I answered the first thing that came to my mind, honestly not knowing what she was talking about.  ”I had a baby.  There’s your warning, kid, don’t ever have kids,”  I said, figuring if nothing else I could scare her a little in retaliation. 

After I’d walked away, mortified, I thought about what she’d said.  What did she mean?  I mean, fat is one thing, but a lot of girls are fat and don’t get asked “what happened?” like a travesty had occurred.  I decided my original response was accurate; it had to be my stretch marks.  Sadly, one of the joys of being tan is that stretch marks show up nice and bright, and in my case, it looks like a lion cub tried to devour my baby when she was still in the womb.

I swear, I tried to psyche myself up and get over it.  I tried the whole, “These are badges of honor, I am proud of them because I have my kid to show for it, etc.,” but. . . it just didn’t work this time.  Maybe it’s because my kid is 13, and my body has had the proof of that birth since I was 17, which means I never got the chance at the body I intended on having, and this led to a downward spiral of self-pity and “I’m never leaving the house again,” which admittedly only lasted about an hour, but still. 

Today, I took a Facebook quiz.  The “What Butt do you have,” quiz, and the result was Kim Kardashian.  I have no idea who this woman is, but I spent the next two hours drooling over Google images of her body.  It occured to me that with enough hard work, I could have a body like that. . . if it weren’t for the stretch marks.  It doesn’t matter how many hours I spend running, hot yoga-ing, or dieting. . .you can’t erase these scars. 

This is a sad post.  There’s no inspiring moral at the end.   Just pictures of a beautiful what-could-have-been, and the precursor to another blog about how much negative press this woman has gotten over the size of her ass.

There is still hope, however.  I’m still going to post a picture of this chick on my bedroom door so I have a goal to work toward.  If nothing else, I can look great in a dress.