The Big Trade Off

 

For the last 4 1/2 years, my son and I have had a ritual.  As a new born, he wouldn't go back to sleep after his 5 am feeding unless I was holding him.  As the years have progressed, our little morning ritual has remained and just about every morning of his life, he has crawled into bed with me and cuddled for an hour or so before he is ready to get up for the day.  This has been my most favorite part of my day and this morning he actually fell back asleep next to me and I laid in bed and watched him sleep for almost an hour.  I couldn't help but be overcome with love and awe for this little person next to me.  Call it the pregnancy hormones, but I feel especially appreciative of just what my body can accomplish.  I have one fully formed, growing, living, breathing, amazing person next to me, and one growing, developing, miracle inside of me.  Laying in our bed, with these bodies I have, and am creating, I am brought to tears over how amazing my body really is.  We are literally Goddesses.  We, in partnership with God, create life. I carefully examined every lash, his perfect skin, his rising and falling chest in perfect time.  His adorable little chubby fingers and his fuzzy shoulders.  All of it is a miracle, and he has it all because of what the female body was designed to do.   God entrusted us women with the most sacred duty there is.  Only He can out do our gift.  No other creation on earth or in Heaven shares such a special bond with our Father in Heaven.  

So, how does this all relate to a weight loss blog?  Well, I am about to tell you!  There are trade offs.  Along with the joy and majesty of being a Goddess, there are physical, and mental consequences that sometimes in our mortal world threaten to overshadow us.  I find myself getting caught up in the trade off.  I feel ripped off that my body doesn't snap back to a size 2 after a baby.  And most recently, I feel jaded by the fact that I am not round and cute like "everyone else" and I just look fat.  This morning it occurred to me that no matter how horribly my outside looks during and after pregnancy, that doesn't change how amazing and beautiful the inside is.  I need to give credit where credit is due and thank my body for giving me my family.  

I will trade a perfect stomach for a stretched out one because that means life was created in there.  I will trade perfect perky boobs for saggier ones because that means I was able to sustain a life with my body alone.  I will trade the 9 months of feeling fat and bloated for looking slim and fit because that means that is less than one year, I created LIFE!!!  Really ladies, it IS so amazing! We should try harder to glorify what we can do, and not make it sound like some short lived plague we must endure.  We are in partnership with GOD!!!  And from us, life is given.