One
day, she will need a bra. One day, she
will ask me to buy tampons and Advil on a monthly basis. One day, she will have her first crush and
her first date and her first kiss and the first stirrings of something in her
heart that she can’t explain. One day,
she will have a boyfriend, and a fiancé, and a husband, and one day, she might hold a tiny bundle of love in her arms until all hours of the night and wonder
if she’ll ever be able to let go.
I’m
not trying to stop her from growing up.
One day, I want her to become a tween and a teenager and a young woman
and an adult and a wife and a mother. I
held that tiny bundle of love in my arms until all hours of the night and
thought I’d never be able to let her go, but eight years have gone by and
slowly, surely, I am letting go. I have
to.
My
jobs have been many as I live out the gift of being her mother – I’ve held and
hugged, rocked and read to, kissed and soothed, fed and bathed, led and
observed, corrected and cheered, pushed and pled and prayed and prayed and
prayed. But mostly, I’ve loved and
protected. These are the two most
important responsibilities I have as her mom.
To love her . . . to protect her.
One day, she will have left my home, but she will forever occupy my
heart, and so I’m trying to do these things right for this one and only
daughter of mine. I’m trying to love and
protect her to the very best of my ability.
The
loving part is easy. There was never a
doubt, never a question, never a moment when I couldn’t find endless love for
her, despite her insistence on testing the depths of my adoration. There is always the love – in the middle of a
night, in the middle of a mess, in the middle of a meltdown. It fuels every action I make on her behalf,
and it’s why I’m writing this letter.
Because, you see, loving my daughter isn’t enough. Plenty of well-meaning parents love their
children. It’s simply not enough. I
must also protect her, and that’s where parenting gets difficult. And so I can't let another day go by without telling you . . . Barnes and Noble, YOU are one of the reasons parenting is so difficult.
Oh,
you aren’t the only one. I heard a
completely ridiculous song playing in Gap Kids last week. Gap KIDS, as in, there will most likely be
children in the store every single day it is open. Still, someone found it perfectly okay to
play a song about casual sex in Gap KIDS.
Yes,
you are one of many. I’ve seen at least
a dozen cars driving around my native Atlanta with the words “Sexy Senior”
written across the windows. I wonder . .
. do the little girls driving those cars have mamas? Where are their daddies? And why oh why haven’t they told their
precious daughters that when someone says you are “sexy,” it’s because they are
looking only at your outward appearance, and not at what really matters . . .
your heart.
There
are others just like you. Victoria’s
Secret decided it was a good idea to put words on the backside of shorts and
pants for young girls, so anyone behind them will be encouraged to look at
their bottoms. Never mind who is
looking, or why. Never mind prostitution
and child predators and the pornography industry and sex trafficking and . . .
never mind.
No,
it isn’t just you, Barnes and Noble, and I wouldn’t be surprised if you think
you’re doing everything right. You offer
an enormous children’s section in all of your stores – even a wall of Christian
books I’ve frequently perused while shopping for gifts. You have story time on Saturdays and invite
Girl Scouts to sell cookies on your doorstep and provide discounts for
educators. Yet every time I walk to your
checkout counter with my daughter, there are dozens of magazines placed
directly in front of her eyes that undermine everything I’m trying to do as her
mother.
She
started reading at the age of five, and overnight, my job as protector grew in
leaps and bounds. No longer could I feel
certain I wasn’t exposing her to things she wasn’t ready to understand. I did everything I was supposed to do –
refrained from talking about inappropriate subjects in her presence, permitted
only ‘G’ rated movies and television suitable for young children, provided only
Christian music and kid-friendly classics in the car and at home. I did everything I was supposed to do. Except for one thing. I took my daughter to buy a children’s book
at Barnes and Noble, and suddenly, my five year-old child wanted to know about
mind-blowing sex.
I’m
fully prepared for the reality that is having a daughter. One day, someone will call my little girl
“sexy.” One day, my little girl will
want to be sexy for someone. One day, my
daughter will be a grown woman, and she will have sex with someone she loves. One day.
But not today.
She
is not ready to hear about sex. She is
not ready to think about sex. She is not
ready to learn about sex. In a world
that seems to have made sex its number one priority, a mother’s job has to
include keeping her children’s innocence intact as long as possible. Yet you, Barnes and Noble, expose every child
that enters your store and walks through the checkout line to sex, regardless
of their age or maturity level.
Are
you contributing to teenage pregnancy? I
don’t know. Are you contributing to the
growing number of young girls in America with low self-esteem and eating
disorders and anxiety and depression? I
don’t know. But you are knowingly
exposing very young children to topics they aren’t ready to understand, and it
is infuriating.
Am
I picking on you, Barnes and Noble?
Maybe. Like I said, there are
many other culprits. There are
nationally recognized and widely respected businesses contributing to the
sleepless nights of mothers all over this county, and I imagine, all over the
world. There are magazines my daughter
shouldn’t have to see in the checkout lines at Publix and Target too. There are billboards on every interstate that
encourage my child to ask me what adult toys are, or how a doctor gives a woman implants, or what the word ‘abortion’
means. When I try to find my daughter an
appropriate children’s movie to watch using the On Demand feature on our
television, there is a completely inappropriate movie playing in the upper
right hand corner that she shouldn’t have
to see.
Why?
Why
is this happening? Why is anyone okay with
this? Why are YOU okay with it?
Have
you read the statistics on teenage pregnancy?
Have your read the statistics on eating disorders and anxiety and
depression in young children? Have you
read the statistics on prostitution and pedophiles and pornography and sex
trafficking?
HAVE YOU READ THEM?
I
am incredibly blessed to be a mother . . . to be her mother. I am so grateful
to have been entrusted by God with the extraordinary duty of raising a daughter, of protecting the child
in my care for as long as she needs me, and I fully accept the responsibilities
that go along with my title of 'mom.' My responsibilities include guiding her and
leading her and teaching her the things she needs to know about the world when
she is ready to comprehend such worldly things.
When
she is ready to comprehend such worldly things.
As
her mother, when she is ready should
be my choice. I should be the one who
gets to decide when my daughter learns about sex. The world wants to throw sex at her from every
direction and I have done my best to intersect it before it reaches her every
time. But I cannot protect her alone.
Help
me.
Please,
Barnes and Noble . . . Gap Kids . . . Victoria’s Secret . . . Publix and Target
and mothers who let your little girls drive around with the word “sexy” written
on their car for an entire city to see . . .
Please
. . . I beg you . . . help me.
Let’s
work together to protect the children of the world. Who knows, maybe we’ll see a decrease in
teenage pregnancy. Maybe we’ll see fewer
children with eating disorders and anxiety and depression. Maybe we’ll make an impact on the tragedies
of prostitution and pornography and sex trafficking. Maybe.
But only when we work together to make a positive difference.
And
so Barnes and Noble, I ask you . . . will you do the right thing?
Will
you realize that there are good mothers all over the country who want to shop
in your stores, but who want to protect their children even more?
Will
you remember that just because sex sells doesn’t mean it is okay to sell it to
five year-old girls?
Will
you remove the magazines placed at eye level for young children from your check
out lines?
Sincerely,
ABW
ABW
