The shirt

I wish you could spare you this worry, dear one, but I know it’s part of becoming human.

**

On the first day of school, Sebi told me he didn’t want to wear a shirt because he thought his friends might laugh at him.

He’s four.

Four, and already hesitating. Already checking the room in his mind. Already weighing the cost of being seen.

Something caved in my chest. Partially because I know this feeling. Because I remember moments of wanting to disappear into safety. But mostly, because I thought we had more time. I asked him if anyone had laughed at him so far to give him this idea. No. If he’d laughed at anyone? No. I wanted to tell him, no one will laugh. But I couldn’t. Because sometimes they do.

He used to wear anything (and sometimes still does). Dinosaurs, rainbows, stripes that clash, costumes to the grocery store, rain boots when its 80 degrees and sunny.

He is still joy in motion. For the most part, just himself… but suddenly, mixed in with the thought of what others might think.

So all I could say was: I love you in this shirt. I love you in any shirt. You don’t have to hide to be loved.

He put the shirt back in the drawer. He chose something safer.

Here is the paradox that lives in me as his mother: I want to protect him from every sting, every sideways glance, every careless laugh. I want to scoop him up and carry him back into the place where he was free.

But I can’t. This is his path to walk. This ache will belong to him.

What I can do is stand beside him. I can remind him of who he is, when he forgets. I can be the place where he doesn’t have to earn belonging, where he never has to fold himself smaller. I can hold him when the laughter comes, and tell him it will pass. I can show him, in my own living, that you don’t have to shrink to be loved.

The shirt has stayed in the drawer since. But each day are new choices, new moments of expression, and maybe he will reach for it still.