Compositions: Imperfect

All I need is 10 minutes to myself.

10 minutes to shower and feel human again. 10 minutes to scour the hospital smell from my skin, to let the water soften the gauze so I can remove the bandages and wash the dried blood from four incision wounds on my abdomen.

The baby is preoccupied in the bumbo on the floor, the toddler should be reading books on the couch. I've just hopped under the cleansing stream and am gingerly removing bandages when I hear a voice at the door, "Is it shower time, Mamma? Eshie is coming!" And before I can think twice a naked toddler is clambering into the shower with me.

I bend down to help wash her hair when she takes my face in her hands, "Mamma? Mamma, look at me. You pretty."

And I wish I could believe her, I wish I could see the beauty in myself.

For them. For her because I want her to see her body as a tool, an instrument, a glorious vehicle that can dance, jump, climb, build, swim, and potentially carry life. For him because I want him to always treat women's bodies with respect and reverence, since it was one such body that bore him into this world. For both, to never judge other bodies too harshly, to allow change to blossom, wrinkles to appear, flaws to be accepted. All things I am still learning myself.

For this body of mine--which has felt like it was mutinying against me for 6 long years--was both their home. Once. Their presence within me tattooed on my skin in the stretch marks I wear. It carried them, sheltered them until it was time to join the rest of humanity on the outside. Even then it nurtured them for a year afterwards, and it will continue to comfort them until I can no longer hold them in my arms and pull them to my heart.

They do not see the flaws I see; neither the freckles nor bad hair days, neither the scars nor the fatigue that settles in my shoulders. Instead they see the arms that hold them, the mouth that kisses their wounds and tells them stories, the eyes that watch them grow... and I must believe in my beauty because they do.


*Full disclosure: I couldn't chose a word last week, so I just started writing, but kept getting interrupted. That's why it's taken me so long to post this...