A mom of three who was feeling insecure about wearing a bikini on vacation got the best response from her daughters.
Alison Perry (@iamalisonperry) from London, in the U.K., posted a reel on Instagram of herself wearing a green leopard-print bikini, captioned with honesty about how she wasn’t initially feeling confident.
“I was trying to build up to being brave enough to wear my new bikini to the swimming pool,” the 46-year-old wrote. “But then I tried it on while my 6-year-old twin daughters were watching!”
In the background of the video, the girls can be heard giggling and shouting praise: “I liked it when you shake and when you did this,” one said, flicking her hair in imitation.
The girls rave about the bikini’s “cool” leopard print and declare their mom “cute.”
When Perry asked, “So, girls, do you think I should wear this at the swimming pool?” both twins shout in unison: “Yeah!”
Perry told Newsweek that, like many women, she has a complicated relationship with self-confidence and body image.
“Since having three kids—14, 6 and 6—turning 40 and hitting perimenopause, my body has changed and I’ve gone up to a U.K. size 18,” she said. “Some days, I love my body, and other days, I want to cover it up.”
While on the family vacation in France, Perry said that she really wanted to wear the bikini but felt unsure.
“I don’t think my youngest kids have ever seen me wear one, but was feeling a bit self-conscious,” she added.
But her daughters’ words shifted everything. “It just made me feel so warm and loved inside,” Perry said. “I realized that they hadn’t found any fault or even commented on my size or body shape; it was more about the fun I was having in the bikini.”
For the mom, it was a reminder of how children view the world—unfiltered by the pressures of beauty ideals. “They don’t yet know that society tells us that slim equals good and fat equals bad,” Perry said.
Her reel has been viewed over 730,000 times and liked by over 24,000 users. It seemed to resonate with hundreds of other moms.
“Love them—best cheerleaders. My kids absolutely transformed the clothes I wear. Helped me so much,” one user wrote.
“This is everything. See yourself through your child’s eyes. It’s so important,” another posted.
Perry said she hopes her daughters carry this confidence with them as they grow. “All bodies are good bodies,” she added. “We come in all shapes and sizes, and it’s better to accept ourselves and not spend our lives trying to change ourselves to fit into a narrow beauty [and] body-image ideal.”
The post Mom Wasn’t Feeling Confident in a Bikini, Then She Showed Her Girls appeared first on Newsweek.
