Shaped by Memory
By Ashley D. Holston
@ashleydholston
I drowned in the lingerie gifted to me for my wedding night.
Peering at myself in the bathroom mirror, my 22-year-old frame felt more preteen than premarital. Lacy garments from tiny bags sagged and bagged on my slender figure, and all the strap tightening in the world wasn’t going to magically make me fill them out. Every frill and ruffle screamed, Lacking! Lacking! There's more that should be here. My wedding was in a few weeks, and while I relished the thought of beginning a life with my college sweetheart, doubts and messages from the past began to resurface. Too skinny, Where are her curves? She’s too unshapely to be considered feminine, or womanly, or desirable.
History dragged me from the present, and I stared, unseeingly, at myself. Who did I think I was, getting married? Was he really sure he wanted to marry unassuming, wallflower me? Sighing, I let the red, silky garments slip to the floor. I shoved them back into the miniature bags even as long-concealed memories slinked from dark corners of my mind.
***
The teacher stood at the classroom door, gathering her things as she prepared to herd her third-grade class to lunch. We tittered and chattered, a flock of chicks waiting to follow the lead of their mother hen. A chuckle buzzed amongst us as we observed for the umpteenth time our teacher’s dark hair, a shock of white striking through the middle of it, not so unlike Cruella DeVil, we thought. I smiled to myself, engaging and observing, when I heard the words directed at me from a fellow classmate’s mouth.
“You. are. so. skinny!” A sneer laced her tone. I typically avoided this girl, whose parents must not have taught her, “If you can’t find something nice to say, don’t say anything at all,” like my parents taught me.
I’m so … skinny? What did that mean … or matter? I thought. As a third-grade girl, the only things on my mind were Gelly Roll pens and Lisa Frank binders, field trips and playground races, school bus crushes and bike rides to the park. Who had time to think about body size when such important matters of the eight-year-old world were at play?
The girl, undeterred by my silence, continued. Planting a hand on her tie-dye shirt adorned hip, she pointedly asked, “Are you … anorexic?”
My insides twisted the way they did when I forgot to brace myself before spinning on the rickety metal merry-go-round I liked to play on during recess. Anorexic? I had no idea what that word even meant, but I could tell from her tone that it must be bad. And not only was it bad, I must also resemble it.
“No, I’m not!" I retorted, turning to look at the back of my teacher’s coiffed head. We filed out of the classroom, my vocabulary expanding as my insides continued to twist.
***
My college roommates and I were discussing bra shopping when one of them, incredulous that hunting for undergarments could be anything but a breeze for me, said, “But you’re just so … ”—she gestured wildly in the direction of my chest—”… flat!” A dam broke.
I began sobbing, surprising all of us. I hated myself for responding so dramatically to something said in jest, so I attempted to laugh it off. I probably sounded like an injured frog as I hiccupped through apologies with tears streaming down my cheeks. My friends’ expressions shifted from playfulness to shock and dismay. They wrapped their arms around me, all apologizing profusely for the careless banter.
“I shouldn’t have joked like that.” Remorse filled my friend’s eyes. “I truly had no idea it would be hurtful to you.” And I believed her. It wasn’t her fault the words felt like a poorly healed wound ripped open.
Yet mortification still burned within me like the day in eleventh grade when, at the end of word processing class, That Girl Who I Didn’t Even Know But Who Had Decided Not To Like Me not-so-quietly jeered in my direction, Maybe she’s not even a girl if she’s got no boobs. I could barely hear the dismissal bell over the sound of my racing heart, could barely see the exit through the tears stinging my eyes. Like an injured animal, tail between legs, I swiftly left the room. But instead of licking my wounds, I pretended they didn’t exist, that they’d had no effect, making it all the more painful when struck in that tender place again.
***
“First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes baby in a baby carriage,” chants the nursery rhyme, and the ditty proved true for us. Less than a year after pledging our love in marriage, a baby followed. My 103-pound frame weakened and lightened every time my body indiscriminately decided to vomit—in the bathroom, at the birthday party, pulled over on the side of the road, in the bank parking lot, on the busy street corner in front of Chipotle. And when glorious second trimester relief arrived, I fought for every pound I gained.
“If you don’t gain weight and breast tissue, you won’t be able to nurse your baby,” the doctor chided, as she scribbled down the number on the scale. Even though I laughed along at the jokes from family and friends about the loaf of sourdough bread I was constantly munching on from my purse, I was really trying to eat away the shame.
***
When you're four, the world belongs to you, and my daughter, the fourth-born, recently reminded me of this, when she threw open the door to my bedroom unannounced. (The house rule about knocking before entering mommy and daddy’s room apparently didn’t apply to her.) I hastily shimmied into some underclothes, my attempt to get dressed alone quickly foiled. I didn’t understand what she was asking for. Animal crackers? Another episode of Doc McStuffins? Either way, she stopped mid-sentence as she approached, a smile spreading across her face. She opened her small hand and slapped my bare thigh.
“Whoa!” She exclaimed. “Those are big!”
Then she did it again, and she watched my skin, dimpled with cellulose and swollen with varicose veins, jiggle under her touch. Her delighted eyes met mine, wonder-filled at her mama’s bouncy body.
I couldn’t help myself. Laughter bubbled up and out of me at her innocent remark. From anyone else, it may have felt like a barb, but from her, I saw it for what it was—a guileless observation, not an identity statement.
***
I dug through my drawers for the “special” underwear, the granny panties that fit just right around my softened belly, tender nether regions, and layers of postpartum padding. I could hardly believe I was doing this, breaking my own rule about staying in bed for the first two weeks after having a baby, and doing so a mere three days after giving birth to our fifth child. But I couldn’t miss my oldest daughter’s first dance recital, so I yanked open another drawer and continued the search.
It was then that I spotted them, balled in the bottom right corner of the dresser, untouched for who knows how long. Several pieces of eleven-year-old lingerie I’d hung onto though they’d never fit.
I’d kept some because they seemed too pretty to give away. And perhaps I’d held out hope that one day I'd grow and change enough to wear them? I recalled a few moments over the years when I’d tried them on again out of curiosity, only to find the bottoms too snug on my now thick thighs and wider hips. The tops seemed to hug all the wrong places while still sagging just as before. Sometimes, I’d still worn them, knowing they weren’t meant to stay on anyway. But mostly, they’d stayed tucked away in a drawer, a reminder of all I’d thought I should be, but wasn’t.
I paused my postpartum panty search to pull out one of the garments, rubbing my fingers across the silky fabric in contemplation. I wasn’t the same 22-year-old who’d opened those bridal shower gifts, the girl whose insecurities ran so deep that she questioned whether her husband, the love of her life, truly desired her. I was a 33-year-old woman, secure in her relationship, and, more importantly, learning to be secure with herself.
I shoved the lingerie and the accompanying memories back in the drawer and opted for an adult diaper.
***
“Mommy, do you have another baby in your belly?”
I groaned inwardly at the question, thinking that perhaps I should’ve spent a little bit longer hyping myself up to wear this slightly fitted tee today. My self-confidence was already waning, and it wasn’t even lunchtime yet. I looked down into the twinkling eyes of my six-year-old, who’d asked me this question innumerable times since the day I gave birth to her baby sister.
At nearly a year postpartum, I still looked, how shall I say this … the same. Well, my new version of “the same.” I’d finally begun to feel at home in my slender, angular body, only for pregnancy and nursing, age and time to soften and mold me into someone I was still learning to recognize. The internal pendulum swung between extremes: from shameful thoughts due to skinniness to shameful thoughts due to weight gain. These silent, repressed struggles would one day be evident before my children, before my daughters, unless I chose to shift the narrative. I would not—I could not—let the voices, mine or the memories, win.
Resisting the urge to suck in my stomach, I responded to my daughter with a smile.
“No, there’s no baby in my belly, baby girl.”
“Are you surrrre?”
“Yes, I’m surrrre,” I mimicked. “But guess what? You used to live here!” I gestured to my stomach. “And your big sister, and your big brother, and your other big brother, and your baby sister! You allll used to live here, and my belly just wants to remember that.”
She looked at me quizzically. “Umm, okay, Mommy.”
What I said to her, I meant for myself.
The growing pains of maturing, the aches that accompany true self-acceptance, the hardships and hopefulness of becoming—my body holds it all.
My body will always remember.
Guest essay written by Ashley Holston. Ashley resides in Maryland with her college sweetheart husband and their five kids, ages eleven and under. When not home-educating or shuttling kids to activities, Ashley loves to read, write, spend time with family and friends, and participate in the life of her local church. Her writing has been featured on Risen Motherhood and in Truly Magazine. You can follow Ashley's musings on faith, motherhood, and everyday living on her Substack, On the Way Home, and her Instagram.
Photo by Jennifer Floyd.