I am raising girls.
This is both familiar- after all, I am a girl- and utterly baffling. I grew up with brothers. DH grew up with a brother. This girl thing is something we learn about every day.
The biggest hurdle we have is one of confidence. When in Kindergarten, LBG got to the start line of Sports Day, burst into tears and wouldn’t compete. The sobs of “I can’t do this. I’m no good at sport.” echoed around the small sports field, along with the sound of my heart breaking.
“I’m no good at this.” was not something she learned at home. The one thing I have been clear about with her since before she couldn’t understand my incessant prattle, is that she can do anything, be anything, if she sets her mind to it. I can only assume that she picked the concept up in school, terrifying in itself because she was just 4 years old at the time. 4.
It took two solid years to get her to that starting line. Two years of playing sport with her at home, of gentle encouragement, but last summer the sound of tears came from me: tears of joy as I watched her fly down the track at Sports Day. She placed in the top three, but I couldn’t have cared if she came in five minutes after everyone else.
Is it any wonder there is a need for campaigns such as #likeagirl, from the Always brand, who are working hard to flip that insult on it’s head and show that girls can do anything? The original video has scored 56 million hits on YouTube because it’s changing the way we think about that phrase Like A Girl.
Now the Always team are back with a new Like A Girl Video, which I just watched with my girls. They wanted to know one thing. When could they do boxing.
The team at Tots 100 and Always are hosting a twitter party tomorrow night– Sunday 8th March 2015- from 8pm until 9pm, on International Women’s Day, to talk about the amazing things your daughters do like a girl, how to keep giving them confidence and a positive body image, and showing that #likeagirl is not the insult it once was.
Go on! You know you want to tell me what you think!