My 11-Year-Old Cousin Asked for a Filter for Her Birthday and I Don’t Know What to Do
Last weekend’s family cookout was the usual—my aunt’s potato salad had way too much yellow mustard like always, my uncle burned the burgers on the grill, my grandpa fell asleep in his lawn chair snoring so loud we could hear him over the Taylor Swift playing from the patio speaker. Lila was on the back step by herself, knees pulled up to her chest, scrolling her phone. It was 85 degrees out, she had on an oversized gray hoodie, and she kept tugging the hem down over her thighs even though no one was looking. I brought her a lemonade and sat down next to her, and she flipped her screen face-down so fast I almost laughed, if it wasn’t so sad.
Her 11th birthday is this coming Saturday, and she texted me last week to remind me what she wants: a yearly subscription to Facetune. Not the new bike she was talking about six months ago, not the concert ticket for that pop singer she likes, just the app that smooths your skin, shrinks your nose, makes your waist look smaller. She said all the girls in her grade have it. If you post a birthday pic or a lunchroom selfie without it, they’ll comment on your pimples or point out that your arm looks fat in the candid. She has one tiny pimple right in the middle of her forehead, I noticed, and she kept dabbing at it with her hoodie sleeve when she thought I wasn’t looking.
I’m not gonna sit here and act like I’m above this. I edited my own beach selfie last month, lightened the dark circles under my eyes from staying up too late working, cropped out the extra bit of my stomach that stuck out over my bikini top. So I can’t stand here on my high horse and act like filters are some terrible evil only kids do. We all do it. We all want to look a little better, a little less tired, a little more like the version of ourselves we think people want to see. But it’s different when you’re 11. When your body’s just starting to change, when every single thing anyone says or comments feels like the most important fact in the world.
I remember being 11. I had braces that cut my lip and I hated my curly hair so much I straightened it every morning even though it would frizz back up by lunch. I cried for an hour once because a boy in my class called me four-eyes. I get it. But that was 15 years ago, and back then the only people who saw me at my worst were the kids in my class, who’d forget about it by the next day. Now everything’s up there, saved forever, liked or not liked, commented on by 30 different 11-year-olds who all have something mean to say. Last time I babysat Lila three months ago, she showed me her Finsta, the one her parents don’t know about, and there was a comment on her most recent selfie from a girl in her math class that just said “ur chin looks weird lol.” I asked her why she didn’t block her, and she just shrugged and ate her Goldfish and said “if I block her she’ll just talk about me in the group chat. It’s easier to just leave it.”
I tried to bring it up to my aunt once, a couple weeks ago. I said I was worried Lila’s spending too much time picking apart her face online, that she’s already talking about wanting lip filler when she turns 18, which is insane to me—11 years old and already planning what you want to cut or change about your face. My aunt just rubbed her temples and said what do you want me to do, Mia? Take her phone away? Then she’ll be the only kid in her whole grade without one, they’ll call her a loser and bully her worse. I work 40 hours a week, I don’t have time to monitor every single thing she does on TikTok. I can’t shield her from everything. And she’s right. I don’t have kids. I don’t know what it’s like to try to raise a pre-teen now. I don’t have the answer she’s supposed to have, either.
The other day Lila texted me a screenshot of a selfie she’d just posted, asking if I thought she should delete it and repost with a different filter. She said her nose looked too big in this one. I sat there staring at my text box for 10 minutes, typing and deleting. First I typed “your nose is perfect exactly how it is, you don’t need any filter” but that sounded so cringey, like the out-of-touch cousin who doesn’t get anything. Then I typed “just leave it, it’s fine” but that felt dismissive, like I didn’t care that she was sitting there panicking over a selfie. I ended up just texting “it looks great :)” which was technically true, but it didn’t fix anything. It didn’t make her stop worrying that her nose was too big.
I’ve started trying to do small things, I guess. When she comes over to my apartment to hang out, I make us bake cookies or do drugstore face masks or walk around the park by my place, and we leave both our phones on the kitchen counter. Last time she came over we got chocolate chips all in her hair and she laughed so hard she snort-laughed, and she didn’t even check her phone once for an hour and a half. It was the most relaxed I’ve seen her in a year. I asked her about the sketchbook she used to carry everywhere, the one she drew all those unicorns and mermaids in that she used to tape to my fridge, and she said she hasn’t drawn in months. Said it’s for little kids. That made my chest ache, for some stupid reason I can’t really explain.
I wrapped her presents last night. One is the nice thick sketchbook she used to beg my aunt for, the one with the black cover that doesn’t smudge pencil. I stuck a unicorn sticker on the wrapping paper, like the ones she used to stick on everything she owned. The other present is the Facetune subscription. I bought it. I don’t know if that’s the wrong thing to do. Maybe I should have just gotten her the sketchbook and told her she doesn’t need that stupid app. But I don’t want to be the person who tells her no, who makes her feel left out when all her friends have it. I don’t want to be just another adult who doesn’t get what it’s like to be her right now.
I’m still worried. I don’t know what’s going to happen. I hope she draws in the sketchbook. I hope she remembers how much fun it was to make something that’s just hers, that no one gets to like or comment on or pick apart. But I don’t have a big inspiring speech to end this with. I just worry. That’s all. (Word count: ~1120)
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