I'm not fat, I'm big boned!

Let's talk about it ladies, our weight!  Even more importantly, our self imagine and how we beat ourselves up trying to be something that we were before we had children.  I gained 70lbs with my first child and I swore I wouldn't do the same thing with my second, so I gained 80lbs.  What can I say, I'm an overachiever!  I'll admit, after my first child my body went back to mostly normal, but that second one did a number on me.  Think about how your body changes to ultimately produce a human being...our organs are moved, our skin is stretched beyond normal, and let's not talk about the mess our breasts become.  Say it out loud and try to wrap your mind around it, "I produced a human being!".  When I step back and think about the process my body took over those nine months, of course it doesn't look like it did ten years ago, and it shouldn't!

Raise your hand out there if you have a pair or a stack of clothes that you swear you're going to fit into after you lose that last 5, 10, 15, 20 pounds!  When my son was two months old and I weighed in a whopping 256lbs and when I looked in the mirror I didn't like the person I saw, but I also had the realization that the body I had now was never going to be the same body I had years ago.  I sat in my closet one day and looked through the bucket of "I swear I'll wear these one day" clothes, I held them up and realized that even if I hit the same weight, there was no way in hell they would ever fit my hips again.  It was a liberating moment to pack up that bucket and take it to the Salvation Army.  I wasn't the same person on the inside and I certainly wasn't going to the be the same person on the outside, and that was ok.

We try everyday to be good mothers and wives, but most of us look in the mirror and put ourselves down.  I try to tell myself everyday, "this is who I am today, be happy, be proud!", some days I believe it and other days not so much.  Look beyond the wider hips, saggy boobs, and a little more cellulite than ten years ago and see what really matters; the strength we have to be women, mothers, wives, friends and most importantly, us!  We are not defined by the what we see in the mirror or the size 8 jeans we can't fit into, but by our strength, compassion, and love we give ourselves and others.