I totally missed my own link-up last week. Yep, made it to Friday before I even realized. I’m a winner like that. But I’m doing it today, so that counts for something, right? Join me if you can! (Sorry for the confusion.)
If you’re new here, this link-up is every Wednesday and it’s based off these two articles – here and here. You are welcome to take the points in any direction you choose, what I go off of is only something to get the ol’ brain ticking. Original post is here.
Previous posts: Week 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 & 9.
Week 8! (One week late!)
I’ve noticed while working through these writing prompts for the past 9 weeks that a lot of it comes back to my daughter. I always thought it was pretty cliché to hear parents say, “Oh, things changed when I became parent!” because prior to motherhood that sounded pretty fucking ridiculous to me. A child is a person, you take care of them sure, but really how hard can that be – change some diapers, have food & shelter, enroll them in school, easy peasy chicken greasy, right?
Apparently there’s this thing though where they learn by example by the people they are around. And who is Lillie around 98% of the time? ME. I feel like there’s this focus when raising children to make them smarter than the rest when I really think as a society we should focus on making them kinder. Teach them empathy, sympathy, compassion – the rest will follow at its own pace.
(Totally want my kid to be smart, don’t get me wrong, but the focus on having the best kid EVER at any cost is really intimidating on both ends of the spectrum)
After my round of post-partum where I said the most vile things to myself every day for at least a year in my head, things started changing when I started exercising. Instead of focusing on all my flaws I started noticing all the great things about myself (I also had most of you cheering me on and having that support helped immensely!) I started liking myself again and the voice in my head did too – I became more positive in how I approached myself and the outside world. During this time, I also noticed how quickly Lillie was picking up on things.
She was starting to mimic me and that just continues to become more apparent the older she gets. I never want her to feel less of a person because of her physical attributes (which happens to be what I’m most unkind to myself about) and I want her to understand that just because your body isn’t what you want it to be, doesn’t mean it isn’t perfect the way that it is. A lot of that is going to come from me by the way I project myself at home.
Things I actively don’t do: (by active I mean, sometimes I have to stop myself because it almost feels natural to think that way, which is really sad and kind of indicative of the culture we live in)
- Say I’m fat (even if I’m feeling that way) out loud
- weigh myself and act disgusted about it
- cry out loud when clothes don’t fit the way I want them too (Lillie is usually right underneath me at all times, so she’s privy to me changing clothes on the daily)
- saying I can’t eat something
Overall, I would say I’m kind to myself because I am actively trying to be kind to myself. I work at it every day (I also have wonderful support from my husband whose loved me at 120 lbs and at 205 lbs) but it certainly has gotten easier the more I do it.
1 comment:
I Iove this! I think your right that she'll mimic all those negative self thoughts just as easily. I can honestly say I picked up on a lot of image stuff from my mom growing up!
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