On feeling punished.

Post-Saturday run.

For most of the last two years i've felt let down by my body. Two years where it has felt like my body will just not work with my heart. This body has been failing me. I do everything the doctors say, what the books say, what random people suggest (well not always, that would just be weird) and still it doesn't work. It's a hard thing to accept that your body won't do the thing you feel like it was made for. It's this innate sense of failure that I don't think I could have ever understood without experiencing it for myself.

I balk when read how much another person loves their body, how amazing we are as humans and what we have the ability to do. But what if you can't do those things? It's a hard feeling to move passed, especially when it feels like everyone else can do it - just not you. Most of the time it felt like my body was punishing me. Each month it rips my heart out and puts me through intense pain (physical as well as emotional). It's hard not to feel like your body hates you and you begin to hate it right back. 

I'd say i'm a feminist. I am a huge believer in women and that they can do amazing things. I've wanted to be a mother for as long as I can remember. I think not only raising a child but pregnancy and giving birth are amazing blessings we are given as women. The fact that a body can transform in that way, sustain life and endure such pain and love all at the same time is miraculous  So it's been so hard to feel like my body has failed me. I haven't felt like this body is very amazing, strong or a blessing.

I woke up not long ago and knew that another month had passed and we were still not pregnant. This time though I felt different. I didn't do anything to make me feel that way. It was God. I can only credit it to months and months (actually years) of praying for help to even just like my body again. That morning as I woke I remembered that i'm the boss here.

I'm not allowing myself to 

feel punished by my body anymore. 

Yes it will still hurt, but i'm going to hurt it right back. I know this body has it's limits and it may not let me fall pregnant for a while (or ever). But if I want it to, my body CAN run a 5k, or weigh what it did at my wedding. My body can make me happy because i'm comfortable with how it looks. 

I started going running and going to yoga. After my first yoga class, for the first time in 2 years I felt proud. My body did everything my teacher asked. It wasn't hard. My body felt strong and powerful. For the first time in such a long time, it felt like this body and I were a team. Even not being able to do this innately womanly thing of bearing a child, I could do more than I ever thought I could. And by working together, my body and I are capable of so much more. 

So look out body i'm in charge and together we can do amazing things.