She Meant Well, Bless Her Heart

It’s been nearly six years ago, but I remember it painfully well.

“I know you,” she said turning to face me, her head cocked to one side. We were standing side by side at the mirror in the YMCA locker room drying our hair. “Didn’t you used to be really skinny?”

Now just how am I supposed to answer that? A part of me wants to say, “Why, yes. I’m a recovering anorexic. How do you like my new voluptuous figure?” Or “I was skinny for a time, but I think that was just the chemo.”

The bigger (well less skinny) part of me wants to start explaining. “Yeah, I used to be a size ‘skin and bones’ but then my husband went to Iraq and I made some bad choices and then when he came back I had some health issues that took precedence but now I’m really trying I mean I exercise all the time and I eat right most of the time and I always drink lots of water and . . . blah blah blah blah listen to my business blah blah blah.”

But all of me wants to scream at her, “Don’t you think I know that? Don’t you think I say that to myself every single time I see myself in the mirror? Don’t you know?”

The truth is, though, she really doesn’t. She is actually not ruled by her weight. And she really didn’t know that her words cut right into the most vulnerable places in my soul. Sure, she didn’t think before she spoke. Sure, she said something most people would consider either nosy or flat out rude. But she wasn’t trying to cut my heart out. She was just trying to figure out if I was the person she thought I was. That really is all. And maybe, just maybe, she left there thinking, “I cannot believe I just said that to her. What is wrong with me? I never think before I speak. I never say the right thing. I’m such a loser.”

I’m just saying, we don’t have to bare our souls when our feelings get hurt, and we don’t have to snap back in anger either. We could say to ourselves, “Wow, that person just said something that hurt me. Ouch. I think I’ll move on now and not carry this hurt with me. Besides, she probably wasn’t trying to hurt me. She just made a mistake.”

I make mistakes all the time. I figure I can give a little grace to others when they mess up. At least that way, I decrease my self-loathing and increase my capacity to forgive.

Increasing Awareness, Decreasing Judgment,
Aileen