To Mothers of Daughters

To a Mum of a daughterTo Mothers of daughters

Tell your daughter that you love her every day
But expect a few, ‘I hate you’s’ in return
Tell her that she is beautiful just the way she is
But let her dye her hair anyway
Tell her that it doesn’t matter whether she is tall or short
But if she is short, accept that she will use fake id
Tell her that it doesn’t matter if her hips are wide,
But still support her periodic healthy eating campaigns by buying quinoa and dates
Tell her that what really makes her beautiful cannot be seen in the hundreds of selfies that she takes every day
But ‘like’ them anyway
Tell her that what is important is in her heart
But expect it to be broken several times and be there to piece it together again and again and again.

16 thoughts on “To Mothers of Daughters”

  1. We are still a bit young for ‘I hate yours’ here thankfully. I’d like to live in denial and pretend it won’t happen please. I dread having a teenager growing up in the selfie generation!

    1. Oh yes, definitely live in denial! To be honest, what I write is often objective and I haven’t personally had to deal with, ‘I hate you’ either (yet!). However, I do have to deal with selfies, hundreds of them, constantly. It is such a learning curve all this and my step daughter was my guinea pig! I honestly am still amazed by this selfie-obsessed generation.

  2. This is lovely. My daughter is three and already obsessed with being pretty. This, in her eyes, is defined solely by what you wear “but you can’t be pretty with no clothes on”. It’ll be a sad day when she loses that naivety!

    1. It will! I remember taking my eldest daughter, who is now 16, to a party when she was 3. She put a lip gloss in her coat pocket. I asked her why she was taking it: so that I can put it on again when I have eaten, she replied! She didn’t get that from me!

  3. This is brilliant. My 3 year old is already insisting on wearing make up whenever she sees Mummy putting it on, something I already feel guilty about. I have to keep reminding her she is already beautiful without any make up, but let her carry on putting on the skin coloured eye shadow because if she sees me do every day, how can I tell her no?!

    1. It’s a tricky one, isn’t it? I am still telling my teenage daughters now that they look better without make up on. Daughter 2 asked me if I’d pay her £10 not to wear make up to school! Sometimes she’ll say to me in the evening: be proud. I didn’t wear any make up today!

  4. Oh I love this and can nodded away to everything – having two teenager daughters I know exactly what you are saying! I have to share this! #ablogginggoodtime

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