Mom Suits

(This is really for the moms…)

            When you have a baby, there is a lot of paperwork.  Insurance forms, hospital forms, the birth certificate stuff and the Skirted Bathing Suit Clause.  Don’t remember that one?  They slip it in between the others.  But I am pretty sure it’s some kind of a law.  Or maybe something they whispered over the room’s PA in the night?  For whatever reason, moms today are compelled to wear those skirted/shorted bathing suits.  (If YOU don’t wear these kinds of suits:  1.  You were walking the halls when they came in with the clause.  2. You are deaf and so couldn’t hear the subliminal instructions.  3.  I hate you.)

Back in the old days I used to wear bathing suits without all the extra fabric.  The only people who wore a skirted suit were old.  Not my daughter’s version of old (that would be me) but actually older- like 70. I fretted about my body back then and wrapped myself in towels and giant t-shirts. (Now I wish for that body!)  When I saw my first skirted mom suit, I was happy!  Yippee!  Camouflage for all the bodily changes motherhood had forced upon me! 

My first “mom suit” actually had shorts and they were wonderful.  As a mom to young children, you cannot lay on a chaise in those poses that make your thighs look smaller.  (You know exactly what I am talking about.  Keep those knees bent!) As a mom, you have to chase around small people who insist on trying to do great bodily harm to themselves.  You need a workhorse of a bathing suit.  One that won’t “malfunction” when you are chasing short ones away from the pool edge.  Or when you are leaping great distances to stop sand ingestion. Or when you are carrying more supplies than a Himalayan Sherpa AND a slippery, sun blocked, sweaty toddler just to get to the pool!  Those are a “mom suit’s” greatest moments…

But those years are now in the past for me.  I can actually relax a little more.  (Now my job is morphing into mentally grueling from physically grueling.  Damned kids.)  Now, when I go in the water, shirts and shorts bubbling up around me are annoying.  And when I come out, they are plastered to me and they keep me soggy for so much longer.  Are they flattering when they are flipped up and askew?  I don’t think so.  If I am running for a towel to cover up anyway do I really still need the mom suit?

So this year, I decided to try something new.  I was going to get a bathing suit. A regular bathing suit!   Okay, not really regular.  I had a lot of rules.  Tankini, good straps so I could bogie board without flashing, and a separate pair of shorts!  Okay, this sounds a lot like the mom suit.  Maybe it just seems like semantics but I was going to have to dash to the water without fabric covering my upper thighs.  That’s scary!  But I was ready to do this.  I hit the stores in May.  And June. And July.  And decided that the military should use bathing suit shopping to torture female prisoners into giving up national secrets...

I tried to be open-minded and took lots of suits into many dressing rooms.  I should’ve made an audio recording of those trips.  All around me women were sighing, snorting in disgust and groaning.  (And if you are a guy who made it this far, we were in our own little rooms with our own miseries.  No pillows, nighties or tickle fights.)  Sometimes there were women complaining to their friends over the wall and sometimes they were on the phone while trying things on.  (They really were.  I am not that coordinated.)  One day, I could hear the woman next to me saying loudly, “Oh my God!” and, a few minutes later, even more distressed, “OH. MY. GOD!”  I felt terrible- assuming that she had just received a phone call about some family tragedy or was with a friend who had a terrible life.  As I exited my stall, she came out of hers.  She was alone.  No phone in her hand- just a handful of rejected suits.  Our eyes met and we sighed together.  Victims of cruel spandex and neon lighting.

In the eleventh hour, just before our family vacation, I found a suit.  I’d like to say it masked all of my body’s shortcomings but it didn’t.  But I felt like I could dash from my chair to the water without dying of embarrassment.  Let’s count that as- Victory!!  

But there’s always a catch… Come back to hear the rest...