Part 2: Chubby and Proud!

Back to that quote I mentioned:

What is healing but a change in perspective?

The change in perspective I had was this: I realised the deep hurt I carried around because I never felt thin enough was something that had to go. It was too heavy a load to bear - and besides, I have Layla to consider: her own health and self-esteem/body-image. If she saw me cringing, year in and year out, in front of the mirror and constantly whining about my body, it could only have a negative impact on her.

My glorious days as a 28 year old single woman (I nearly said 'girl'!) and how fabulous I felt about every inch of myself shone deliciously in my heart and I realised it did not merely have to be a memory, but that I could make it a reality again (minus the singleton status, of course!) What caused me to head back down this bleakly treacherous path after such a fabulous blooming? Motherhood. I hate to admit it, but being pregnant and a new mom was devastatingly different to how I had always imagined it would be. And, I think that maybe I may have even been angry with my body for betraying me during the birth of my child: firstly, having to be induced with Sintocinon because Layla was in distress and had literally shat herself in fright, and then not dilating more than 2cm and hearing my as yet unborn child's heart stop and having to be rushed into surgery for an emergency C-section.
My pregnancy saw me carrying huge amounts of water - both in my womb and in my body, with once-petite ankles as swollen and shapeless as an elephant. (I was actually going to reference my late Norwegian great-aunt again and her lace-up shoes over which her ankles bulged, but felt a bit guilty. The necessity to accurately portray the immense fatness of my ankles prevailed, I'm afraid...) At 5 weeks, I glibly announced to the world that it seemed as if the morning-sickness curse had passed me by, but come Week # 6 and I was cuddling that toilet like there was no tomorrow! The GP announced his complete conviction that I was carrying twins. (I didn't tell him how, since I was a little girl, I had always prayed to not EVER be 'blessed' with them! Apologies to my identical twin sisters, Mandy and Julie.) I proceeded to vomit all the way through my pregnancy, having to dash out during teaching, or - most memorably, having to frantically stop the car on the side of the road in Milton Keynes on my way to do nursery shopping at IKEA to cover my boots and jeans in the peach yoghurt I'd just eaten to quell the nausea! Driving past the white-washed spot on my way back, I can actually remember my cheeks burning with humiliation!

(Sheesh, I DO get distracted, don't I?) My hands were so bloated that I couldn't wear my engagement ring - or any rings, for that matter! And none of my pretty pumps fitted my feet. Most disappointing? Asking Craig to please pick up a pack of size 16 panties at Tesco because - well, it's obvious, isn't it?! Boobs I could proudly flaunt at 34DD ballooned into 38F monstrosities, complete with wildly itchy skin, bright blue veining and, quite literally, a life of their own. (Lunchtime - time to feed my precious Layla something yummy! Part 3 coming soon: I know I got sidetracked again - but I've got to keep you hooked and coming back more, don't I?!)

Chubby and Proud!

My sugar-less (to clarify: the 'less' signifies I am ingesting less sugar as opposed to a sugarless diet: how could I never have another chocolate or bowl of Ben & Jerry's?!) diet is going fabulously: there is definitely something to be said for the marvels of moderation! I can't quite remember just who said it, but this quote expresses more succinctly what has happened to me in the last month than I could ever attempt:

What is healing but a change in perspective?

Being 'chubby' has haunted my eating days since I was ten years old. Pretty young, huh? I think it was the school nurse (a short and - rather ironically - rotund old woman with short grey hair and the wrinkliest face I'd ever seen on anyone except my Norwegian great-aunt) who suggested my mom haul me off to a dietician ASAP. Looking at photos of myself at that age now, I am deeply angry that I was deemed even vaguely overweight. Certainly, I was not blessed with a beanpole physique and a skyrocketing metabolism, but my body was cute and round and healthy. The usual ball-oriented sports at school like netball and tennis saw me cursed with butterfingers and bored to tears - and I often managed to almost-legally bunk all my Phys Ed classes from primary to high school by needing to practice my flute (wink, wink.) Climbing trees didn't suit me much either: my twin sisters would chatter with not-too-subtle glee at my mom having to fetch the ladder to get me out the high arms of the leafy avo tree in our back garden. (I could climb up - it was the getting down that didn't agree with me.) Another moment of humiliation? Slipping clumsily off the rocks we were using to cross an almost torrential river while hiking in the Cape mountains while my sisters nimbly hotfooted it across and my dad calling me his 'little mountain deer'. Yes, he was being sarcastic. But besides these sorts of incapabilities, I was an excellent little sailor - representing South Africa when I was a mere 13 years old at the Mirror World Championships in Holland! And for you of you who have never sailed a dinghy in the famous South Easter - it is blerry hard work: you need to be fit and super-strong! So ball-sports aside (and river-rock-hopping), I wasn't an unhealthily slothful child at all. I simply preferred stretching my brain muscles to other muscles; 2 to 3 hours a day was a normal amount of time for me to spend practising my flute, for example.

Provitas skimmed with a mere lick of marge, and carefully dolloped with exactly measured-by-grams fat-free cottage cheese and early morning jogs in the dark before school were my punishment for having a body that wasn't supermodelesque. It didn't stop there either - I continued to punish myself for not being thin until about two years ago when I finally managed to leave my exercise-obsessed, fat-free fanatic ex who certainly didn't help me accept myself for who I was. Before I met my husband, I enjoyed two glorious years of unadulterated glory in the eyes of quite a number of delicious young men who unabashedly adored my healthy curves - and the word 'diet' never once crossed my happy mind. My husband,a bit of a Jack Sprat himself, is my biggest fan - even with my new mommy-body which has taken me 11 painfully arduous months of self-psychology to make peace with. I can't quite say that I am at the 'love-myself-to-bits' stage yet, but I can see it on the horizon, at least!

{This is just the beginning of much, much more on this universal and layered topic: more will follow as soon as Layla (aka HRM = Her Royal Majesty) allows.}

I cheated... {blush}

A week or so on, and I am bursting with pride to tell you that I am making my New Year's Wishes come true! No more small mountains of cookies with every cup of sugary coffee; instead? black coffee or rooibos with no sugar, and I fill my tall petal-pink glass jug with water, placing it on a little round antique crocheted doily atop a gold-filigreed porcelain saucer - and then regularly fill up a turquoise, circa 1974 tumbler with the metabolism-boosting, cleansing, hydrating water from the tap! Despite being very anti-exercise-to-look-like-what-we-think-we-should-look-like, I've embarked on a relaxed journey into enjoying the God-given gift of my healthy body instead! Step 1: Layla and I dance every day to her nursery rhymes DVD (fave song of the mo? The Hokey Pokey), our Putumayo World Music CDs or anything that tickles our fancy. Step 2: Instead of the bathroom looking like a dedicated aquatic playground, I took back some space for myself - tidying up Layla bath toys up and away onto the wall, and packed a basket full of delicious Body Shop and Lush goodies: strawberry body polish, cocoa body butter, olive oil body wash... (I have to add here the serendipitous detail about how I came by this extravagantly big basket of delight: On Friday, I popped in at my South African friend down the road for lunch, and she asked if I 'needed any smellies'? She had been stockpiling them over the last year - gifts she couldn't possibly hope to use up by herself. And I was the lucky one she wanted to share with! This exquisitely timed gesture of hers has literally given me back to myself. Thank you, Ang!)

Layla's asleep in her bed - occasionally swiping her mouth in her sleep from the teething pains. And as my fingers fly excitedly across the keyboard, I wish I was a fully-fledged writer, with my name splashed across arty glossies, national newspapers and - and - and... This could be one of my New Year's Wishes, right? Access to the internet is absolutely critical, in terms of research. Or is it? (I'm just thinking about how I'll manage when we don't have broadband back in SA...)

... hours pass.

In the meantime, I have found an apparently EXCELLENT internet provider which my sister is already using : Afrihost! So maybe we will have internet access after all :) One of the steps I can take towards becoming a writer is to stop researching how, and actually start writing articles, risking life, limb and possible heartache by sending them in to magazines. And maybe, instead of whining about how little time I have, I could schedule a few hours on the weekend where I can be alone (i.e. focused) to write and polish an article. OK - so as a first step towards granting this New Year's Wish to myself, I hereby schedule a writing date with myself and babysitter/husband for this weekend! Voila ;)

PS. In the hours indicated 'hours pass', like an addict in the painful throes of craving, I clambered up onto the kitchen counter and ripped open the Quality Street tin (actually panting with sugar-lust) and grabbed a handful - not even stopping to carefully choose my favourites... I think I broke a World Record : 5 chocolates unwrapped and scoffed in less than 60 seconds. Any challengers?! But - as I said to my mom: it's ok if you fall off the wagon once, 'cos you can just sommer climb back on!

Wishes versus Resolutions...

Leo Babauta is an inspiring blogger I discovered quite by accident one day when I typed 'how to be a domestic goddess' into Google. (Sigh) Embarrassing to admit, but it has been many years since that has bothered me. Anyway, the long and the short of it is that his blog, Zen Habits, has completely demolished my devout belief that New Year's resolutions are nothing more than a sad old cliche, with his latest blog entry.
Despite the very Buddhist vibe in the blog title, the concepts covered are decidedly not New Age, but extremely practical and digestible, unlike so much of the opaque 'crystals 'n yoga' literature out there. (Hope I haven't offended anyone?) Getting dressed after my nightly bath with my little girl, I discovered I had reached that point in my life's trajectory where I could simply not put on another post-baby/too-damn-cold-for-exercise/bored-so-let's-eat-shitloads-of-sugar kilogram. As much as I had tried to reconcile myself to 'be the size you are' and other such sloganised, self-loving beliefs, I have had days when I look at myself in photos and mirrors where I don't really like what I see. And besides that, there is my health to consider! (Yip, another cliche. But when you push all these cliches aside and find the reality you are looking for, it is both harsh and comforting. Like throwing open the curtains and windows to a gorgeously sunny morning after a night of way too much red wine.) Babauta's suggestion to take things extreeeeeemely slowly, and to let go: let go of EVERYTHING holding you back like past failures, fear of failures, blah blah blag... Well - it just makes so much sense. The clarity he paints through his simple suggestions is so different to anything else I've ever encountered in the 'help yourself' arena.
Anyway, part of what he suggests is making your resolutions PUBLIC. Ouch. But being accountable to more than just yourself makes it so much easier to make decisions on whether or not to gobble down too many McVities Chocolate Digestives for lunch instead of putting in a drop of elbow grease and making that healthy, wholewheat sarmie... that big glass of water or another glass of pinotage... And so, my friends, it is here that I very publicly declare that I am on a mission to love myself again! To not merely make an effort for others, but to look after myself too.
Wish me luck - and plenty of encouragement :)