Well, ladies, I'm taking a break today from my crafty posts to talk about something that has been hard for me all my life. Weight! I have always been considered the "big girl" next to my friends. My whole family is big, not only in the amount of people we have, but for the sizes that we are! Diabetes, heart disease, depression, high cholesterol, and many other bad thing run rampant in my family. I was over weight before I got pregnant with my first and it was so hard for me to get on the scale 9 months after having her and see that I weighed the same that I did one week before being induced into labor. WHAT?! How had that happened?! So I started to lose weight. I lost 27lbs in 3 months and I felt fantastic. Then I started to feel not so great. On Easter Sunday last year I started bleeding. I was having a miscarriage. It was confirmed a few days later and that doctor told me to take it easy and not exercise for about a month. So not only was I dealing with this emotional blow of going through a miscarriage, I also was not able to take my emotions to the treadmill and work it off. Then about 2 weeks after we found out we were miscarrying and had my daughter's 1st birthday, I conceived our son. When it was confirmed that I was pregnant, I was told that I needed to take it very easy as I had a 90% chance of miscarrying again. What a stressful time for me and my little family. But even though he tried to come out at 31 weeks, and I was put on bed rest for 2 months, we delivered a healthy and wonderful little man!
Now I only gained 18lbs with him, but I weighed myself the other day and I am only 8lbs under what I was at my last appointment before I delivered. WHAT AGAIN?!!! I have been working out hard all summer, but pretty much most of August and up until tonight I have had to put my exercises on hold because my kids have been sick and I just couldn't pull myself together to do it. I had lost my motivation completely. Until tonight!!!
Have you ever watched "The Biggest Loser"?!!! Let me tell you, I watched it when I lost my weight last year and it gave me such great motivation. I watched it this evening and it did the same! While I sat there, crying through the whole thing, I thought, "If they can do it, so can I!!"
I will never be skinny, plain and simple. I will never be small, I'm 5' 10 1/2" tall. I'm big no matter what I do. But like me, so many women out there struggle with their weight after having kids. All those sleepless nights, going 90 miles a minute and forgetting to eat, and when we do eat it is usually chicken nuggets in the shape of dinosaurs or a scoop of peanut butter. Mom have an up hill battle. So much is needed of us, required of us, and we put ourselves last on our list of things to take care of. Now, I'm not suggesting that we need to put us first all day everyday, but what I do want is for all of us to look at ourselves in the mirror, not at the rolls, not at the stretch marks our children so lovingly gave us (unless you are my cousin who had both her kids with no stretch marks, I think she's an alien of some kind), not at the bags under our eyes from lack of sleep or the wild hair if you haven't gotten a shower in that day. But look at what an incredible piece of your family you are. Look at how your body created the children that make us laugh and cry all in the same second. Look at what your husband sees, a woman who has given him the best gift in the world, a child, a woman who overcomes things daily, who may be terrified everyday that she is not enough, but is the most incredible woman he has ever known.
Look at your arms that hold and carry and comfort your children everyday. Look at your face the way your baby does as a source of comfort, laughter, and excitement. No, our bodies will never be the same after kids, but dang it, I'm ok with it. I am ok with my stretch marks and dark circles under my eyes. They are like battle wounds that I wear with honor... well under my clothes at least, don't want too many people seeing those. I want us to celebrate what we are and if you want to lose weight, do it, but know that the body you have now has been wonderful for your kids. It is soft and warm and can snuggle like no one else can for your kids.
So the moral of this post is:
Take pride in your body. It has been good to you and your family.
P.S. I am working on my first giveaway! I will hopefully have it ready for this weekend so stay tuned! Are you as excited as I am?!
Wow, what a great post this is! I can really relate to this, because I was very overweight in my adolescent years and it was such torture. I was made fun of all the time, and I just wanted to die. Luckily I grew to 5'8" and it all evened out a bit :o) but I'll never forget how it felt. Diabetes, heart problems, and depression all run in my family, too! And I just had a miscarriage in March (on my husband's birthday!), so I can relate to that, too.
ReplyDeleteI'm always pretty hard on myself, but it's nice to be reminded of how important and strong we are as mothers. What would they do without us? :o)
P.S. I think you are beautiful!
P.P.S. I saw that you put up my button, thank you so much!!
I'm always impressed with all you do. Seriously. AND you work out A TON! I never really worried about being "chubby" til I watched biggest loser as well. I DON'T want diabetes which runs in the family, I'm tired of being fat. I was 20lbs heavier than I wanted to be when I got pregnant, so after delivering I was DETERMINED to shed the weight. 11 months later I am 62 lbs lighter than the day I delivered. You can do it, you are amazing. PS I must win this giveaway!
ReplyDeleteclap clap clap! well said. i think we're too hard on ourselves as women. i have the scars from having a baby, but they're proof of what i went through, and that's nothing to sneeze at!
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