A Tiny Step on the Long Road to Self-Love

You guys. THIS is the post of the series. A close friend of mine emailed it to me. As soon as I started reading, I couldn’t stop, and I felt SO grateful that she was willing to share it with us. I really hope you’ll consider passing this post on, because even if self-love is coming more and more naturally to me—or to you—it isn’t working that way for everyone, and you never know who this vulnerable story could touch. Thank you!

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The day started with a rejection.

No, not a rejection. But it sure felt like one.

Most mornings, I find both our three- and five-year-old boys next to me in bed. But this morning, only the younger is sprawled out beside me like he owns the place.

Soon I hear the five-year-old down the hall. He’s wake-up-wailing in that big-boy way: not so much of a cry as a screechy complaint. Stomp, stomp, stomp.

I look to the open bedroom door, waiting for him to emerge.

And when he does, he’s all tousled hair, wobbly morning legs, and sour face.

He shoots one quick glance in my direction. Then, without a word, he turns around to head down the stairs.

I should be used to this by now. It shouldn’t hurt the way it does, the rejection.

No, not a rejection, I tell myself. He loves you, too. You should be grateful he wants his Dad. Chill out, already.

It doesn’t work. The hurt is one thing. The guilt at being hurt, at not being able to shrug off my son’s innocent action for what it is – nothing – is another beast entirely. In a matter of milliseconds, the fire of self-loathing swells. It’s always at the ready to consume me.

“Dad isn’t downstairs,” I tell my son as he takes a first step down the stairs. “He’s in the shower.”

My heart, beating:

Love me. Love me. Love me.

My brain, screaming:

Are you freaking kidding me?! What’s to love? You don’t even love yourself!

My son doesn’t hear me over his stomps. “Dad is in the shower,” I repeat, a little louder.

He stops his descent and returns, now clomping across the room to find his dad in the bathroom.

Still not a glance at me.

We don’t interact again until later that morning, when I thread a shirt over his head. Apparently I’m doing it all wrong, because that’s what my son tells me when he pushes away, screeching and mad.

Rejected again.

No, not rejected, I remind myself. He’s just tired, and probably coming down with a cold or something.

No. I want to punish him for being rude to me. I want him to hug me and whisper I love you, mom. I want to dissolve into a million floating pieces of nothingness.

The guilt…the anger…the self-loathing. It’s a miracle I can even drag myself to the car.

Time for the gym. Something to keep the three kids and me busy during these last days of fall break.

No. Two kids. In an act of supreme childishness, I refuse to bring the offending son and order him to stay put with his work-from-home father.

He doesn’t want to, but I won’t let myself be rejected a third time. So I do the rejecting instead.

As I drive, I squeeze the steering wheel tighter and tighter. I park outside the gym, but I can’t even get out of the car. The self-hate, the not-enoughness…

Not to be dramatic or anything, but my feelings are killing me. If not my body, then my soul.

And then, a text message from my husband. A picture of my son holding a self-scribbled note of apology. A note of apology he shouldn’t have had to write in the first place. If I were…more.

I hate how I’m letting his sweet, repentant face and note move me. I hate how I’m not letting it move me enough.

No gym. I return home. Not to make up with my son, but because I’m sick. Sick of myself, of allowing things like this to happen. Sick of being broken.

I will never be able to love myself.  The thought just sits there, like the fact it is.

No, I will never be able to love myself. No matter how much my dear friend Erica blogs about self-love. Why did she have to start that radical self-love series, anyway? And why am I unable to follow her advice? What’s wrong with me? Why am I so wrong?

I wish I could say that when I return home, I fall on my son with a multitude of hugs and kisses.

I don’t.

But when I am ready to bridge my hurt and cross over to healing, I wheedle my son out of a closet. As he emerges, he tells me something that stops time:

I am bad.

Oh, no, I think. No, no, no, no, no, a thousand times no.

I am a disease, and I’m spreading. My son is becoming me. A tight knot of self-loathing. Of insecurity. Of not-enough.

As I bundle my hurting son into my arms, my mind plucks out Erica’s experience, which I read about on her blog only yesterday. The one where she asked her sons to say aloud I love myself.

I can’t do that exercise with myself. But with my son? You bet I can.

First, I tell my son he’s not bad – he just makes bad choices sometimes (like mommy).

Then I tell him to say aloud:

I love myself.

He squirms a little. Smiles. Then he says, I said it in my mind. But I ask him to please say it out loud.

His voice hesitates a bit as it explores new territory. I love myself.

Together, we repeat a few times:

I am not bad. Sometimes I make bad choices, but I can do better. I love myself. 

I can see it working. The hurt, melting off his face.

I will never be able to love myself, I think. But maybe, just maybe, I can help my son love himself.

And that thought—wouldn’t you know it—makes me love myself just a teeny tiny bit more.

When my son waves me off to the gym (because on these terms, he actually wants to stay home with his dad), he’s like a shiny coin, freshly minted.

He’s not bad. He even has a mother who tells him he must love himself.

Now she just needs to tell herself the same thing.

I love myself.

No. Not yet. For me, the road to self-love will most likely be long. But like the sage says,

The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

Maybe. Maybe I am ready to take another tiny one.

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