I brushed my teeth as my 2 year old entertained herself on the tile playground below. A q-tip here, a dust bunny there, a roll of toilet paper to stream about, just enough to keep her busy for those few short moments before the day was off to an official start. Rinse and spit, rinse and spit, a sideways glance at a haggard face. I put my toothbrush down and noticed my daughter digging through a pile of old magazines. It was of no consequence at first but as she dug deeper I caught a glimpse of an old enemy hidden underneath. As she scattered the glossy pages filled with waif thin models across the floor, I saw it surface...
My scale.
My daughter looked up at me, eyes wild with excitement. What was this magical toy I had been hiding from her morning after morning? I forced a smile and quickly began to pile the magazines back on top of this forgotten foe. "No Mommy" she shrieked. "Play, play". My heart sank and I knew there was no way around it. I realized this was a crucial moment. How I handled this could be the difference between my daughter loving or loathing her body forever. If I picked up the scale threw it across the room and screamed “Nooooo don’t touch it! It’s evil, EVIL!!” I could be doing irreparable harm. But it went against every bit of fat in my body to embrace the beast that terrorized me for so many years of my life. I took a deep breath, looked into my daughter’s eyes and said “Of course you can play with it. Of course.” I did it, I was off the hook. Or so I thought. For the first few minutes my daughter was intrigued by how she could stand on the scale and the numbers would whirl around. She’d step on and off, on and off. It was the bravest thing I’d ever seen in my life. But soon she craved more. Her little body provided only a short whirl of the numbers…she wanted more and she was coming after me. “On Mommy,” she barked. I pretended not to hear her. “On, On, On!!!” she demanded. As I stepped on the scale I tried desperately to mask my horror as the numbers flew by, finally settling on a number. As I stared at the distressing digits below my daughter smiled and clapped. I had done my duty as a Mom and made my little girl happy.
Thank God she can’t count past ten.
