Right now I'm in the middle of reading Queen Bees & Wannabes by Rosalind Wiseman. This book was the basis of the movie Mean Girls. If you are the parent of a daughter, these both are musts. It will take you inside the world of girls, pre-teens, teens, and make you check your own personal baggage.
I have so enjoyed the use of the Internet in my life. It has helped me connect and reconnect with so many women from my past and new women I've recently met and love. I've found in my correspondence with many, that we all have some of the same issues we had as girls and pre-teens.
One friend that I go way back with actually caught me on FB the other day and IM'd me. "Thank you for being nice to me when everyone else made fun of me and said hurtful words. It took me a long time to get over those words, but once I did, it only made me stronger."
I hope she doesn't mind that I'm sharing that, but I think she speaks for the majority of us.
Many of my mommy friends express frustration with their bodies. I think as girls/women we struggle with trying to be what society and the media tells us and shows us to be.
There is a chapter in Wiseman's book called The Beauty Pageant. It describes in length the game of the beauty pageant. She states "Adolescence is a beauty pageant." Would you agree?
Isabel, 17, says "It is impossible to win the contest. . .but I think a lot of girls perceive others to be the winner, but in actuality those girls are just as competitive and unsure of themselves as everyone else."
As women, we go through many transformations. Some are easy and we hardly notice. Others are difficult and we work and work and try and try and still don't see results.
Tonight I'm writing to you from the latter.
So many of you know that for the past 20 weeks, and especially the last 10-12 I've been very conscience of my food choices, calorie intake and commit to working out 5 days a week or more. Part of my journey was traveled with a group of ladies during a weight loss challenge.
Guess who didn't lose hardly any weight?
Guess who consistently weighed in every week?
Guess who documented her food intake and exercise with myfitnesspal.com?
Guess who worked out 30 minutes or more each time?
Guess who didn't see any results back from the scale?
Me, me and me.
I got so tired of it. I admit that I would rarely go out b/c I felt so gross and felt so self-conscious about how I looked. Everyone would say "Cut yourself a break. You just had a baby." "It's just muscle." "It must be b/c your breast feeding." No offense, but that didn't help. It didn't make my jeans fit and it sure didn't make my thighs seem lesser. And like every other time I've had a baby, my self esteem was shot.
Nevertheless, here I am 20 weeks after having a baby. I'm only 10 lbs shy of when I delivered him. Even if Jillian Michaels herself walked into my house, I would NOT be embarrassed by my progress, food choices and water intake.Even though I'm doing everything right, here I sit still trying to make it to my weight goal.
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Butterflies are near and dear to my heart. So it is only fitting that I use their life cycle as my metaphor.
"Just when the caterpillar thought the world was over, it became a butterfly."
I love the TV shows Losing It or The Biggest Loser mainly because I love the reveals. In the beginning, you can just tell the people weren't taking care of themselves. You can tell things are weighing heavy on their minds (no pun intended.) But at the reveal you can also tell that they went through a transformation. They look healthier, happier and stronger. Something about their hard works shows through their eyes and their smile.
I'm going to share with you my own slow transformation.
Pic 1 - April 2009, months before getting pregnant
Pic 2 - November 2009, 5 months pregnant
Pic 3 - March 22, 2010, delivery day
Pic 4 - March 23, going home!
Pic 5, May 2010, 2 months after baby
Pic 6, July, 4 months after baby
Though I have not lost the weight yet, I think you'll be able to see that I have lost something, most probably have come through some emotional hurdles as well, and I hope that you can see in my last picture that all those hours of eating healthy and working out did transform me in some way. I know this because the minute I posted the last picture in this series, people started commenting on it with positive feedback. I feel healthier, lighter, and happier.
You can never fail if you never stop trying.
I like this, very well-put. I can relate to a lot of it. Thanks for putting it into words! And as always, thank you for being such an inspiration to others!
ReplyDeleteGreat post!!!!
ReplyDeleteI needed that.
ReplyDeleteWonderful post and I too have been struggling and I actually would be embarrassed about my lack of exercise and some of my food choices so put your head up high girl and keep working it! It will pay off and you look stunning in EVERY one of those pictures!!!!
ReplyDeleteWOW! This is how I feel about myself. Thanks for being such an awesome woman, both inside and out.
ReplyDeletegreat post Tisha! I love your outlook on this journey....looking forward to joining you all in the current challenge
ReplyDeleteMaybe it's just me, but your background isn't showing up, i had to highlight the post to read it. It says the image has been removed from photobucket.
ReplyDeleteOn to your post.
Girl, I feel ya. You know I do. I'm doing a plan right now that is CHANGING my life. Unfortunately, it doesn't work for nursing mama's b/c it's based on a VERY low calorie diet as well as some other stuff.
I can see the difference in your face. Baby weight is so hard to lose, and you're older this time than the other two, so it's even harder. You have to take that into account, that every year you age, it gets harder and harder to lose the weight.
That came out really negative, I didn't mean it to!!! You're not old!!!! It's just harder the older we get, to lose the weight. I know you can do it though. When you're done BFing, if you've still got weight you want to lose, I'll tell you about what I did!!!