"I don't tell my daughter she's beautiful."

I can't believe people actually admit to that. Like they're proud of themselves for being above a compliment or just sooo deep.

I read a blog where a lady goes into great depth describing how being told throughout her life that she was beautiful had left her burdened with a false sense of self and a misunderstanding of real character value. She said she tried to keep herself from telling her daughter she's beautiful because of that. Too much focus of physical attributes can be damaging. But so can too little.

Dictionary.com's definition of the word beautiful:

Adj.
1. having beauty; possessing qualities that give great pleasure or satisfaction to see, hear, think about, etc.; delighting the senses or mind: a beautiful dress; a beautiful speech.
2. excellent of its kind: a beautiful putt on the seventh hole; The chef served us a beautiful roast of beef. wonderful;
3. very pleasing or satisfying.

My daughter does have beauty. And she gives me great pleasure in many ways, she delights me, she is excellent, wonderful, pleasing, and satisfying.

My daughter is beautiful.

And I will tell her that every single day.

Will I tell her that her hair is nicer than someone else's? Or that her perfect skin makes her a better person? Of course not. Telling your child they are beautiful does not equal teaching them vanity. Vanity is learned through rudeness, excess, undeserving entitlement, parental behaviors, etc. I fully believe that you can teach your child that they're beautiful as well as teach them not to be vain. Maybe that concept is just too complex for these deep thinkers... /sarcasm

I've read that instead of telling them they're beautiful, a parent should focus on telling a child they're intelligent, or delightfully inquisitive, or whatever other baloney I can't be bothered to BS my way through. Why does it have to be an either/or thing? I tell my kid she's smart AND beautiful.

I had a lot of self-esteem issues starting at a very early age and still deal with them today. I'm self conscious about my appearance. Am I better off because I feel intelligent (or at least not super dumb), crafty, spiritual, etc? No. Just no.

And it's not just about telling your daughter they're physically attractive or "pretty" in the sense of runway model or movie star type pretty. It doesn't matter if she has stringy hair or acne or huge birthmarks or if she's absolutely flawless and actually is a runway model. Your daughter should be beautiful to you, and she needs to know that. 

It's our jobs as parents to make sure our kids feel good about themselves. Because who else is going to do it? Sure, they might end up marrying someone awesome that tells them they're lovely, but what about the first twenty years of their lives? What about those social skill building years? What about those teenage years that have lifelong effects? That's OUR time. How will a child feel when their parents... their parents... spent 18+ years avoiding the subject of their beauty or appearance? What would you think if how you felt about your face was a taboo emotion?

My daughter has "failure to thrive" which, in our specific situation, is a cop-out name for your kid is totally healthy but doesn't fit on our graph thing and we don't know why. Do you know how many times pediatricians have looked at my baby girl with squinty, skeptical eyes while trying to determine what's wrong with her? Only to decide that she's just not average sized.

I despise going to appointments for that reason. My daughter is totally healthy in all ways, but has to stand there and be pondered over. It hurts my heart to think of the day when she'll realize what's going on. Someone is looking for her flaws. Actively seeking out her imperfections. Analyzing everything about her to find that "AHA! There's her abnomality!" factor.

It's my job to make her feel beautiful. To make her know that she is. Inside and out and in so many ways. To teach her that being a beautiful person is NOT about fitting into categories and standards. She is not too small or too skinny or too pale or too anything. She is absolutely beautiful in every way possible. Anybody and everybody is beautiful, and THAT'S OKAY.