“And I was with you in weakness.” -1 Corinthians 2:3
My 8-year-old once had a violent rash dotting her legs and arms. People stared, kids made fun, and my daughter became horribly self-conscious. She wanted to hide and cover up, because it’s much easier looking normal and unblemished than sporting clusters of strange, red bumps that attract attention. To help her avoid questions about the rash that plagued her, Grandma took her on a shopping spree for pants, a rare and impressive find in midsummer. After weeks of hiding, and days before we could finally get in to see the dermatologist, the red dots mysteriously disappeared.
I’m happy that irksome rash is gone, truly I am. But part of me is also grateful my daughter had to struggle through what it felt like to look and feel different. You see, that rash gave her a new depth of compassion and character, and a capacity to share in another person’s affliction one day, in whatever form it may take. When a kid gets teased on the playground or harassed about the pimples erupting on her cheeks, I’m pretty sure my daughter’s going to stand beside her and help her friend through it. Those blemishes left her better off.
Whether we’re 8 or 38, it’s scary to wear our imperfections. And as parents, our “red dots” aren’t always so obvious. Sometimes they’re physical: the ways our bodies have changed after having children, or how we never measure up to the Photoshopped images bombarding us in the media. But red dots are often psychological stigmas: post-partum depression, obsessive-compulsive behaviors we’d rather avoid, anxiety that fills our every waking moment, loneliness. They’re also matters of identity: of being a working parent, an at-home parent, a non-traditional parent or the single parent juggling it all. Whatever your struggle, this I know: we all have insecurities, weaknesses and quirks. Yes, all of us. Only some have done a better job hiding them and, tragically, concealing in shadow the wonderful gifts they are.
Embrace your red dots, Moms and Dads. Wear them openly. Let others around you know that you’re not a perfect parent, that your less-than-honor student is still the apple of your eye, that your Pinterest project made the “Nailed It!” buzzfeed… and you’re owning it. Blessed are the poor, the meek and, if you’ll allow me to embellish, the courageously imperfect. The world has enough phonies. What it needs are a few more marvelous misfits facing the sun.
Wendy Connelly, faith columnist, is a graduate student at Saint Paul School of Theology, Leawood, and co-founder of the “Live and Let Think” faith dialogues at her church in downtown Kansas City.