Mom Says She Got Dress Coded at Library Story Time Because She Wore a Sweater and Jeans (Exclusive)

“It’s strange to be scolded like I’m a teenager at 38,” Hilary Filipowicz tells PEOPLE.

A woman is going viral after reporting she was “reprimanded” for what she wore to children’s story time at her local library.

Hilary Filipowicz says she was excited when she picked out her outfit for story time April 3 at the Cleveland, Ohio, area library, where she often takes her 3- and 1-year-old daughters.

“Postpartum is a strange time — you never know what to wear, what looks good on you,” the 38-year-old stay-at-home mom exclusively tells PEOPLE. “My closet has three different sizes of clothes. Getting dressed is a difficult situation.”

So when she bought a pair of high-waisted Topshop jeans (pants she bought, she says, in her “cool girl, New York” days) and realized they fit her, she was delighted.

“These jeans are over ten years old,” she says with a laugh. “I was excited to fit in with them.”

Paired with a basic tee and long-sleeved cardigan that fell over the top of the jeans, Filipowicz looked, she thought, like any millennial mom.

Until a librarian came up to her and asked, “Are you a mom or a babysitter?”

When Filipowicz responded that she was a mom, the librarian told her, “You should know better” in what she described as a “judging, tsk, tsk tone.”

Thinking the librarian was referring to her children being too loud, Filipowicz says she “immediately started apologizing for my daughters’ behavior.”

The librarian then replied, “No, your outfit,” Filipowicz recalled.

In a TikTok video describing the situation, Filipowicz said the librarian then gestured to her sweater and jeans.

“And I realize it’s because (the sweater) is a little short and when I wear my giant 1-year-old, it lifts up and shows maybe an inch of my mom’s belly… And apparently, it “It’s inappropriate to show anything. belly when you’re approaching 40,” she says in the video. (Cleveland Public Library representatives did not immediately respond to PEOPLE’s request for comment.)

The video, which was shared shortly after she said she wore a “dress code” to the library, has since racked up more than 65,000 views and sparked a viral conversation.

Related: Woman Goes Viral for Taking Her Ex’s Clothes Off the ‘Good Hangers’ and Keeping Them for Herself, Hundreds of People Encourage Her

And while she was frustrated by the situation, Filipowicz said she didn’t want to shame the library or librarian in question.

“I’m a big lover of libraries and we go there several times a week,” she says. “My preschooler is obsessed with books, and as a mom, it’s hard to find free activities.”

She continues: “This particular library is one we go to a lot. So it’s strange to be scolded like I’m a teenager at 38, especially since I’m totally in my mother’s era . I would never do anything for ” “

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Filipowicz says she first shared the story as a sort of “temperature check” — “I wanted to make sure, you know, can I still wear this?”

Looking back, it also gave Filipowicz the opportunity to discuss body confidence with her daughters.

“I want to teach my daughters that a person’s body shape is not the most interesting thing about them,” she told PEOPLE. “Before you leave the house, we now do a comfort check and a happy check – if you feel comfortable in what you’re wearing, that’s all that matters.”

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