A Scar Is Born

It's bikini season once again and to be honest, I'm not so thrilled. Well, to be very honest, it's because there just below my navel is a scar between 2 and 3 inches long, an ugly horrible mark where Indie came from.

Hell, who would have thought that in this day and age one could still get scars like this from C-section! When I woke up from my drugged stupor that day, the first thing that entered my mind—well, of course next to the baby—was the wound. I remember slowly reaching down to feel it with my hand and finding out to my horror that the bandage protecting it was not horizontal. It was, Oh God, vertical. I remember closing my eyes and praying it was just another one of those drug-induced dreams.

The silent anger over a bikini cut that didn't happen quickly dissipated the minute I saw the baby, baby Indie with the darkest eyes and the loveliest cheeks. She was definitely worth the... how did they call that cut anyway?

I was so into my baby and the excitement of motherhood that thoughts of the soon-to-be scar were somehow pushed down the bottom of my brain, albeit temporarily. But then exactly fourteen days after my giving birth, the moment of truth came, rather too early actually. It was time to take the bandage off, time for me to lay my eyes for the first time on the dreaded scar. It was still a bit fresh. Unsightly no doubt. No, hideous. That I was not ready for it was an understatement.

After that day, everything just seemed to sag. My face. My neck. My boobs. My stomach. Plus, of course there was my ego.

For a self-confessed manic-depressive, I'd say I got over it pretty fast. Like a week, two weeks. All right, a month maybe. Still! Postpartum depression could be a lot worse than that. It could only be Indie. She was so adorable she could make me forget about a lot of things. Like scar serums. Plastic surgeons. And oh yes, even bikinis.

Not completely though. But over the years I have learned to accept that looking for the right bikini would be a persistent problem, a problem which I believe will not go away until I near perhaps my mid-50s. Thank God for the return of the maillot. But then again I have yet to find the right maillot for me. But that I suppose is another story.

I'm proud to say I have learned to live with my scar. The love-hate relationship is to be expected. I can be a vain woman after all. That it will be with me till the day I die does not give me cause for hyperventilation, not anymore. Of course, I still find it ugly. But what scar is pretty? It is no beauty mark but a mark nonetheless, the single indelible mark of my humble contribution to the circle of life.