Sticks and Stones

It's funny how 30 years after an off handed comment was made, that I still think about it.
I was around 11 years old. I was off to a friends house for a slumber party. We were friends through Church, or my old school. I can't really remember. Her name was Brenda. It was her birthday and I remember being nervous because she was having friends that I had never met before, and some that I knew. She lived in this not so awesome house with an incredibly awesome backyard in an awesome neighborhood. The trees in the area were the tallest I had ever seen inside a city.
This particular sleepover was for her birthday. Her mom sent us on a scavenger hunt around the neighborhood. The typical things, a piece of red thread, an apple, those types of things that would be easy to find. The twist was that we had to dress up in clothes from Brenda's dress up trunk. I grabbed out a dress to put on. It fit, but I could not do up the buttons in the back. I remember Brenda's mom coming in and saying, "Maybe we can find Erin a shawl or something. These dresses aren't really made for someone as... FULL as Erin is."
In other words. The dresses were made for FLAT chested girls. Not ones with boobs. It literally ruined my entire night. I was so self-conscience of my chest for the rest of the night, that I hung out at the back of the group as to not flaunt the fact that the gap at the back of the dress had to be covered with a shawl. I remember how I could not wait for morning to come and my parents to arrive to get me.
That was the last time I ever saw Brenda. I refused to go over to her house ever again.
Parents, please. Be aware of the words that you use around your Daughters, and around her friends.
Sometimes off handed comments can stick with people for a long long time. Especially when they are in that awkward stage in life where body parts are doing strange things.