Today in Totally Unnecessary Comments from Mom

"Be careful with the iced tea, dear!" she says to me, after I've asked dad to bring me up an iced tea from the basement, since he was going down to feed the dog anyway. I gave her a look, of course, and asked her why she said that, and then she did that amused face where it's like she finds it cute that I'm so mad about this. I hate it when people do that. It's condescending.

As good as it is to be home (and it is so good, believe me) it's also a bit painful. Partly because it's hard to realize that my family is having a family life without me, they are doing things without me and having in-jokes and watching movies, without me. To be fair, though, I am also having my own life quite separate from them now. But it's also painful to be home because it means once again that my mother can slip little comments like that into my life, and make me spend the rest of the day poking at my stomach and wondering why my ab muscles aren't as prominent as they used to be.

I think part of it is because my mom sees a lot of herself in me. She was once a lot like me, she says, very tiny and petite, and from what she says of herself now, I don't think she realizes how beautiful she is. And because of that, I think she worries about me, that I will turn out like her, that I won't be beautiful, but that doesn't make any sense at all because, like I said, my mom doesn't realize how beautiful she is.

Sometimes I wonder if she realizes how much those comments sting. Some days it almost feels like that's just another thing I have to strive for, that I must stay this same size forever, that despite anything else I am going through, I must not gain any weight at all. Sometimes it feels like I would be a failure to her if I was to not be the size I am. Sometimes it feels like I'm already failing her. I carry those comments with me everywhere I go and I miss the days when I was still growing up, before she thought it necessary to comment on my growing out.

I know I should be able to let them go- she's my mother, of course she loves me and will always be proud of me, it would take an awful lot more than a size change to make me a failure in her eyes. But the fact that she places so much importance on this weighs on me.

It's just- every time there's a new comment, I add it to the list, and end up reviewing it. You need to start being careful about the chocolate, dear! You're growing out now, and not up when my very tight pink dress was suddenly very tight again. You have such beautiful thighs... you don't want them to get lumpy and ugly when I was eating candy over the summer, vegging out because I was on vacation. And now this. Not to mention endless "Hmms" and looks with eyebrows at plenty of meals.

Sometimes I think it's really selfish. My mom should stop taking out her own body image worries on me and should deal with them herself. But then I think I'm not really mad at her, I'm sorry for her, that this is how she feels.

I've lost count of the number of times I've made plans in my head to eat less and eat healthier, before catching myself right at the end and realizing what a bad idea I was forming. It's helpful that I have lots of other people in my life who don't really give a flying fuck what I weigh or how big my thighs are, but for crying out loud, she's my mom. That alone gives her comments importance.

I realize some people might think it's stupid for hurting about this, but I also realize that there's a lot of other people in the world who get the same thing, and not just from their mothers, or maybe not even from their mothers at all. Even despite all that, my feelings are completely legitimate, and I don't really care whether you agree or not.

yer pal,
swegan