The font I am typing with is called elephant. Why do I find this important to say? Because I feel like an elephant! I'm 194 pounds with rolls on my back and underarms that could take flight should I fall from a three story building! Am I over exaggerating? Most definitely yes! Well… not about the actual number I weigh (I wish that weren't true) but the wing arms, yes! When Jonathan and I first met I weighed 135 lbs and looked great in anything and everything! J
I gained some honeymoon weight… 10 pounds and when I got pregnant with Abigail I weighed 145 lbs. Not too shabby. After she was born I weighed in at 188 and by the time I went in for my six week visit I weighed 165 lbs! So I had lost 23 lbs. J Then the unthinkable happened…
Jon and I were playing scrabble and without skipping a beat he asked me (mind you this came out of nowhere) "How long has it been since your last cycle"?
Instantly my jaw dropped. It dropped for two reasons; 1) I was three weeks past my period and 2) I totally forgot I had those! Being pregnant for so long and not having one it's hard to get back into that groove and to remember. I took a few or four pregnancy tests and sure enough I was "with child". Was I happy? No. I cried… ate… cried… ate… cried and so went my life for three weeks. We went into my doctor and when I stood on that scale a second time I weighed 175! I had gained 10 pounds! And ever since then it has gone downhill.
I realized though that during my pregnancy with Abby I was face down in the toiled 22 hours a day, everyday (so it seemed). And with my little Bronco I've only thrown up a few times but have otherwise been feeling well, have a voracious appetite for everything fatty and greasy and have also been too tired to workout often.
When I look at my wedding pictures and then go to the mirror I see before me a foreign object covering up the woman I really am. Sometimes I pull back the fat on my neck and face until I see the old me and stealing a line from Hook say "There you are Pan!" My dear husband swears up and down that he loves every inch of me and doesn't even notice the "twin" growing on me. When I'm feeling down, his words are comforting but most times, when I'm in my emotional frenzy, I accuse him of "just saying it" because he has too. Now, is that really too far from the truth? J
As many times I look despairingly at my disfigured and oblong shaped body and feel awkward and fat, I also feel beautiful and miraculous! I am growing within my body a child of God. And when I have those moments, my stretch marks become labors of love, my love handles become support beams for my growing belly and my fat rolls become cushions to protect Bronco if I should fall. My saggy bottom is a cushion for me when I am sitting and my flabby underarms are extra fluff for the first day I hold my baby boy in my arms!
I know that all these discouraging body changes are only a small part of what I have to go through to really appreciate my body after the baby. And with a loving and ambitious husband we can whip me back into shape in no time. For now, when I am getting ready for the day and my hair falls out and each step sends an earthquake through my little apartment… I'll try to remember that my body is a working on a miracle and the worse I look and feel means the better he'll look and feel when he is born! If only thinking that worked 100% of the time! J
