Stories by melaniep (3 matches)

A Little Lace for My Mum

My 89-year-old mother was visiting me. As she was helping me fold laundry, she commented on how pretty my bras were and lamented that when she started wearing bras, pretty ones weren't available. When they were available, she couldn't afford them because she and Dad were raising a family. Then she felt too old for them.

I decided to take Mum down to my local lingerie shop.  A wonderful salesperson professionally fitted her for a lovely, lacey, colourful bra while telling her no woman was ever too old for va-va-voom.

Mum would have considered it frivolous to spend more than $20 on underwear, but I bought the bra she liked the best. The smile on her face as she left the store with an elegant little bag containing a puff of lace wrapped in tissue was amazing. She hasn't stopped smiling since.

A Spouse's Space to Feel

My husband's family has a long record of cancer (parents, uncles, aunts, etc.), and he also comes from a background of physical abuse as a child. One of the things he has always been afraid of is that I might leave him one day, because that's what his childhood taught him happens to things he loves - they get taken away. On Friday, I found out that I may have cancer, and we are now on the treadmill that follows that sort of news. He was trying to be supportive and strong for me, but I could see that there was something fragile behind the strength and realized that his childhood nightmares were there - he loves me, and he might lose me. So I told him every day we will spend some time where he isn't strong for me; time when he can cry, and rage, and be silent, or whatever ... Read Full Story >>

Collecting Bras for Free the Girls

I organized with the ladies at work to bring in their unloved bras - not the ones that have been worn so much that they are now only good for supporting pumpkins in the garden, but those we have worn once and then relegated to the back of the drawer because they pinch or squash or were never going to support us but looked so pretty we just couldn't resist.

I took the 15 bras we gathered down to my local lingerie shop, where the owner sends them to Free The Girls, an organization that uses them to help women set themselves up with a market stall so that they don't have to work in the sex industry to be able to feed their families.

36 Acts of Kindness