Bless My Little Heart

2.5 Years: “Awww, I hurt my poor little knee. Bless my little heart.”

I’ll embarrass myself for a moment by confessing that I was steeped in “bless your heart” as much as I was steeped in sweet tea. It was such a ubiquitous part of the language of my region that it never occurred to me until I was in my mid-twenties that the phrase wasn’t used nationwide. Someone’s heart was always being blessed when (and where) I was growing up, and, although I’ve heard many people from outside the area say that it’s always an insult, it’s really not.

As far as I can see, there are three main reasons to bless someone’s heart. The most common and famous, of course, is to excuse a vicious insult. I’m not above the time-honored habit of saying something unflattering about a friend or relative, then following the remark with, “Bless his heart,” to make it okay. It makes sense from my perspective: once you’ve blessed someone’s heart, you’ve shown that you care, and that you’re sympathetic, and that anything you said just an expression of concern rather than an attack on the person’s character.

The other motivation behind “bless your heart” is to let someone know that he’s making a fool of himself without flatly saying as much. I still recall a bachelorette party where I was loudly singing along to Elton John after having a few too many fuzzy navels, and didn’t realize how much I was humiliating myself until a friend leaned close to me and whispered, “Bless your heart.” Yes, ma’am. I’ll be quiet, then. Thank you for letting me know. This use of “Bless your heart” is especially useful for telling flirtatious men and drunk chatters that they need to pipe down to avoid any further embarrassment.

Although the other two uses are probably better-known, I’m more likely to hear and use the old phrase as a genuine expression of sympathy, especially toward someone who is weak or small, like a child or animal. If a friend’s kid is sick, well, bless her little heart. I hope she feels better. If a baby is born prematurely, bless his heart. I’ll make sure to give his parents a call. If someone’s dog was hit by a car, well, bless that poor puppy’s heart. He was a good dog. To me, “Bless your heart,” is just what you say to, or about, someone whose heart needs blessing.

I’m sure that these unintentional displays of my roots are why my daughter quickly learned to bless her own heart when she was hurt or sick. For years, every slip, trip, stumble, and scratch was followed by the declaration, “Bless my little heart!”-- often followed with, “It’ll be alright, sweetie. It’s okay,” or “Shhhh, Cuddle Bean, it’s okay!”

Parenting books frequently talk about self-soothing—often critically, since it’s the driving philosophy behind controversial parenting techniques like the Ferber method. But, in my experience, there’s no need to teach kids to self-soothe. You just need to let them spend enough time around Southern women to learn how to bless their own hearts in a moment of crisis. It’s the simplest and most effective self-soothing method I know of.