Day 4-ish

Ok, so I missed posting yesterday. But, I had plenty of insights, and this time into my own body image journey.

The first thing is this: I weighed myself, thinking that maybe I'd lost something, because I seemed fitter than last week. But I had no change. So this got me thinking, as I am slightly apt to do.

My ultimate weight loss goal was 50 pounds. That's about 6 pounds less than I am now. I have been trying to lose this 6 pounds for a good 6 months. And it's not happening. No matter how hard I work out, no matter how much I restrict my calories, it just never happens. But my body changes. And I stay the same weight. So, I have decided that the weight and body type I am right now is what I'm supposed to be. It's the way God designed me to be. There are still a couple things I'd like to streamline, like building more muscle and losing more fat on my upper thighs (yes, I know nobody sees them, but I do, and I don't want them jiggly). Long story short, I've decided to stop putting the focus on losing weight, and putting the focus on making my body stronger.

And honestly, I do like the way my body is now. I like my curves, and I like the muscle tone, and I think it's really not all that bad. It also helps that Daric thinks I'm beautiful :)

I also, for the first time since high school, wore a bikini in front of other people yesterday. It was great. I felt really good about myself, and I'm happy that I took that step. Yes, my body isn't perfect, but I'm still attractive, and I felt good so that's what's important. That was a pretty big step for me, and I'm glad I overcame it.

I guess that overcoming your fears is a choice that you make. That seems like the understatement of the year, but it's true. Like I was saying to Daric the other day, all the stuff I write in here about this journey make seem pretty obvious to some people. But I think that everyone needs to actually learn and experience these obvious things in order to really own them and live them out.

I'll write about Day 5 later. :)

Much love,
Amanda

Day 3

So, Day 3 didn’t start out that great. My allergies have been bugging me a lot lately, and they make me quite tired. Especially since I can’t sleep if I can’t breathe. Breathing is important. And when I get tired, I tend to get extra frustrated with myself. Note the use of the word ‘extra’. Because really, I am normally frustrated with myself. Very easily. I tend to forget things pretty easily. Like, for instance, yesterday I forgot my dinner at home and had to go back for it. Which in turn made me late for work, another thing that frustrates me, because it happens all the time, due to my lack of remembering things. Plus, as I realized last night, I had thought about what I was going to eat yesterday, but forgot about today, yet another day I’m in the box office alone for awhile. So my lunch consisted of a cold, 2 hours old bagel with cream cheese from Tim Hortons. It’s still food, but it’s not the best lunch ever. I planned to make something before I left for work this morning, but guess what? I forgot.

I also tend to misplace things a lot or just fail to put them back in the proper spot. My favourite/most annoying example of this is how I like to pile my clothes on the back of my desk chair instead of putting them away after I’m done with them. So I frantically try to figure out where my blue sweater is on the morning I want it, only to have to sift through 7 different piles of clothing to find it.

Oftentimes, I say that ‘I hate being myself’. Yes, this is terrible. I don’t say it because I hate myself, but being myself can be very frustrating. I can’t seem to remember things at all, or be organized at all, no matter how hard I try. I’m hoping that once Daric and I are living together and I actually have enough space to put my things, this will improve. I don’t honestly see how it can get worse. My whole life is crammed into one room with two cats and too much stuff.

Maybe the problem isn’t me. Maybe it’s my life. My life is not what I want it to be. Not yet anyways. I mean, I found a wonderful, amazing man who loves me more than anything, but he’s stuck in a sandpit of doom halfway around the world. My everyday life is made better by having him, but it’s still what it’s always been. It will soon be what I want it to be, and if I can just hold out for another few months, I’ll get to it. And I’ll have an apartment to put all my (our) crap into. And organize the heck out of it. As much as I can’t wait for that, I will never resent him for doing what he’s doing. He loves it, and he’s brave. And I know that waiting for that everyday life we want will make it so much sweeter. Plus, he definitely has it worse. CHUs are not the Hilton.

Speaking of him…well, to put it mildly, he likes to buy me things. I say I’d like to have something, and he’s all “You’ll have it in a week.” He loves to buy me gifts, and wants to provide for me. And yet, this morning when I said I wanted something and he wanted to buy it for me, I told him no. I thought, it’s too expensive. I don’t deserve it. I need to earn it. And then I thought about that and realized something. That it’s bullshit. I wouldn’t allow my amazing husband to buy me something that I have wanted for a while, all because I don’t feel worthy of it? A thought that brings me back to my self-esteem. Why do I feel like I have to be worthy of a gift from my husband? Beyond him thinking I deserve it and wanting to buy it for me, I shouldn’t need a reason. I actually prevented him from showing me love because of my own sense of devalued worth. What kind of person does that make me? I’m sure there’s a nicer way of saying ‘a huge bitch’, but I’m not creative enough to come up with it. So, I’m going to force myself to apologize and ask him if he still wants to buy it for me, and let him. I give myself the excuse of not wanting to take advantage of him and his kindness and love, but he says he knows I won’t, and I’m not that kind of person. So by saying that, I’m actually covering up my own low self-esteem by making myself seem like I’m denying him buying things for me for his own good, when it’s really because of my own crappiness. Not good for a relationship. Not good for a self-esteem. I won’t do it anymore. I wonder how else people cover up their low self-esteem by pretending they’re actually doing something to help/save/respect/(fill-in-the-blank) another person instead.

I know one thing…denying my husband’s attempts to show me affection is not good for either of us. And so it ends.

Since I’m at work, I can’t access my email to see what my assignment is for learning about the Proverbs 31 woman today. I might post on it later. This, I just needed to get off my mind.

Much love,

Amanda

Day Two

Ok. Day two.

I didn’t really know what I was going to focus on today when I woke up this morning, but it came to me later tonight.

My secular half has chosen to focus itself on the idea that being kind to others, stopping myself from judging them, and refusing to think negative things about them, will boost my self-esteem.

To the immature fools in us, this is counterintuitive. We DO judge others, and we DO think negative things about them, and we come up with many reasons why we’re better than them, and this boosts our self-esteem. Until it doesn’t. This is all very high school. I’m better than you because I have more money. I’m better than you because I have better clothes. I’m better than you because I’m skinnier…more athletic…popular…smarter…funnier…

I got all of the above in high school. Except skinny. I was the skinny one…and athletic, because of dancing. My prom dress was a size 2. Somehow, I feel like if I can get back to that, I’ll be all happy and rainbows and sunshine and whatever. But today at work, I looked in the mirror, and thought, “damn I look good today. My body is perfect.” That’s a big step for me, and that is good, because I am definitely not a size 2 anymore, and I’m still happy with myself. Hopefully I can stay happy when I have PMS and am bloated all huge and…bloaty-like.

Back to my point. I’m sick of the high school way of thinking of myself vs. other people. I don’t want to be in high school again. It sucked. I want to be what I am. 24 (and a half!), a grown-up woman, getting married, working on getting the life I’ve always wanted. I’ve always said I don’t care what other people think, but that’s a lie. I do care, so instead of allowing myself to think of all the ways they could judge me, I judge them first. I am admitting it. I judge other people. I judge their clothes, I judge the way they look, I judge the way they talk…and the list goes on. I’m not going to lie and say I don’t do it, because I don’t lie. In order to fix myself, I need to focus on the parts that actually are ugly too.

Stopping myself from judging and looking down on others will help me feel better about myself. There are lots of people out there who treat life as a giant competition, all to see who is more or less of whatever than whomever. I don’t want to compete like that. If I did, I’d be in a beauty pageant. But this is not a beauty pageant, it’s my life. And it’s easier to change my way of thinking than to change how this crazy society of ours works. I found today that if I’m not judging others, I’m freer to be nicer to them, and that allows me to be who I really am. If I’m not criticizing them, I don’t criticize myself. Not judging others based on how they look means I don’t do it to myself. Not judging others based on how they look frees me to be happier, and allows them to be themselves to me. I don’t know where this knowledge will lead me,  but right now it’s helping me to love myself and other people better. Which is what Jesus wants from me. Which leads me to the next part…

My Christian journey today took me into a deeper realization of who the Proverbs 31 woman is. Truth is, she’s just a normal woman, like me, on a path. All the things she does and is…they didn’t become a part of her overnight. She worked a lot to get there. And she has struggles, still. Just like we all do and always will.

It’s awesome to realize that a real woman can still be held up as an example to follow from God. He doesn’t want perfection from us. Not yet. That’s what happens in Heaven. He just wants us to try. But we can’t try without Him. We need Jesus in order to become this woman, and Jesus will lead us down the right path in order to make us into who He needs us to be. Becoming a woman of God does not happen overnight. It took me years to truly understand His love and what it means to be His daughter. It will take a long time for me to become like this woman, and I can only do it with the help of Jesus in my heart.

Tonight I’m going to take a good look at the Proverbs 31 woman and identify what parts of it I’m on the way to becoming. That will help me recognize better what God is teaching me when He is.

Today was a really good day. I look forward to what tomorrow brings.

Much love,

Amanda

Day One!

Today was my first day of my self-esteem makeover, and I’ve got to say, so far I’m doing pretty good. I haven’t had that many negative thoughts about myself, and when I have, I have forced myself to stop right away. Things that have brought down my view of myself in the past are merely frustrating me, instead of making me think less of myself. I guess making the conscious decision to improve my self-esteem, all by itself has already started to improve it.

My two activities today were fairly simple. The secular part of my journey has started with two lists: one with the things I like about myself, and one with the things I like about my body. The latter isn’t only about how my body looks, but how it functions as well. I’m not going to share these lists with you, but I do recommend the activity, if only to force you to think only positive things about yourself. I might eventually make a list of things I want to change about myself, but not until my journey here is done.

The Christian part of my journey involves a blog called TrueWoman.com. On it, they offer a complete 30-day makeover sent to you each day by email, and containing Biblical wisdom and teachings. The first day started with an introduction to the Proverbs 31 woman, something I have always been interested in. I have always seen her as a source of inspiration, something to strive towards. I have read that other women don’t like this example as they see it too difficult to achieve, but I disagree. It gives me a Biblical standard and example to follow, which is exactly what I want. So, I read through the passage again, and I decided to start with identifying the things in the Proverbs 31 woman that I see in myself.  I see things like ‘hard-working’, ‘strong’, ‘generous’, and I know I am those things. So, that makes me feel good about myself, because I know I’m on the right track to becoming a woman that God is even more proud of, and that my husband will be even more proud of. Part of this whole journey is to make myself into someone who can bless our marriage and keep it strong, instead of weakening it because of the negative thoughts that fill my head. I also love the part of Proverbs 31 where it says that her husband praises her. I haven’t yet done much for Daric, but he does this all the time. And for that, I am grateful, because it fulfills this feminine need in me to be loved and cherished. He is so loving towards me, and it just makes me smile and makes my heart warm.

My plan with Proverbs 31 is to read it everyday for 31 days, and allow God to inspire me through it. I’m sure there are multiple ways to become and live out the things in this passage, and I want God to show me how I can fulfill them for Him and my husband and our eventual family. I hope to share my different insights as I learn more.

For the rest of the week on my secular journey, I plan to focus on the things I have listed as what I like about myself, and add to the list if I can. I plan to stop negative self-talk as soon as it appears. For my Christian part, I’ll just keep following the emails that TrueWoman sends me, and letting God inspire me about the kind of woman He wants me to be.

So far, so good :)

Much love,

Amanda

on self-esteem.

As Daric and I get closer to our wedding date, I’ve been wanting to do a lot of preparing myself for marriage. I can’t wait to be his wife, and I want so much to ensure that our marriage will be strong and intimate and protected. My worst fear, as he is well aware of by now, is infidelity.

My life has been full of abandonments, both slight and devastating. Before I was born, my life had experience abandonment by my biological father. Many people will think that getting over a father you never had would be easy, but it’s not, because as you look around at all the other families that have one, you realize what you miss. God stepped in, and did so much, and then put my stepdad in that position, and I have and will ever be grateful for that. Still…the abandonment there can be like a scab. You pick/think about it, and it opens, but if you leave it, it will heal. Until you pick it again. It’s mostly healed now, but it’s kind of a scar now.

Other people have come and gone. But because of my original experience with abandonment, those comings and goings have affected me pretty deeply. The lack of caring about feelings, people not willing to try to heal broken things, pretending like everything is ok when it’s not. These are things I have experienced in situations out of my control, but my marriage is not out of my control, and I will not have them creep in and destroy us. Because these things lead to my greatest fear. And we’re back to infidelity.

I don’t pretend I don’t have these fears, and I tell Daric, and he lovingly says…it’s not going to happen. Don’t worry about it. Relax.

And I believe him, but that fear is there, not like a scab, but an open wound. I think and think and see that at the root of it all? I don’t think I’m worthy of the love he has given me. It’s a simple, powerful love. It has changed me and made me happier than I ever thought I could be. It has given me goals and purpose, and a dream come true. All through Daric, right from God. And my greatest fear is to lose it. And the easiest way for me to think of that happening is for him to wake up one day, look at me, and decide…she’s so not worth giving up all the excitement I had. And he says, NO. I don’t think you’re boring, and I am willingly and gladly giving up all of that to wake up next to you, my love. But my fear persists.

So I know I need to stop my fear in order for my marriage to be unplagued by my self-doubt. So I think about self-esteem. What does it mean? How do I improve mine? Why do I think so little of myself in the first place?

I have many reasons to why I think of myself as unworthy. The main one is media. The other is how I see myself and my life. And other little reasons about what people have said to me in the past, the way they’ve treated me. I’m apparently very sensitive.

So, in order to safeguard my marriage, I realize I need to shut off this voice in my head. So, I’m making a concentrated effort. Over the next 5 weeks, I’ll be undertaking a complete self-esteem makeover. It will be partly focused on secular things: the media, how it affects me, how I feel about myself and why. How I can change my self-image to be more positive and confident. Rule #1: I am not allowed to weigh myself more than once a week. I have lost almost 45 pounds over the last year and a half. Why is that not enough for me? I don’t know yet. I’ll find out.

The other half of my makeover will involve God. What does He think of me? What does He expect from me as a woman? What does beauty and worth mean to Him? What does a real woman look like to Him? How can He help me heal my self-thoughts and free me from these chains?

Although my blog is usually reserved for my creative writing, I am putting this all in here, and hopefully will update everyday. I choose to put this in here because two questions I have been wondering are: Why don’t we talk about this problem? When does it stop?

I want this self-image problem to stop with me. I don’t want my sons thinking all women are insecure spazzes. And I especially don’t ever want my daughters to feel this way.

And I also hope that what I learn will help other women. It’s time that we break free of the media’s expectations of us, and live up to our own, and if applicable to our lives, God’s expectations of and desires for us.

Much love,

Amanda

if you understand the feelings distance creates.

when i was in the second grade, i got punched in the stomach by a boy.

being apart from the one you should be with is like suffering an emotional punch in the stomach everyday. or punch in the soul. or both.

i see that not everyone understands the tumultuous feelings that come with such an arrangement.

perhaps if everyone was forced to spend time separated by distance from their true mate they wouldn’t take them for granted or fight as much. they would hold hands more or remember to say ‘i love you’ each morning as they parted.

a simple task can become mostly unbearable.

a shopping trip can come to a swift and bittersweet end as you stand in a store being caught off guard as you realize that ‘marry me’ by train is playing on the overhead radio and that this mundane task would be beyond incredible if only you were holding hands with your husband (-to-be…although such a distinction is one i make for the picky who may read this and not one i make in my mind).

you stand in the store, holding a skirt, hearing the song. a song you love and listen to often while thinking of your love. holding back tears the only way you know how…deep breaths and the desire to not have everyone staring at you. what kind of woman cries while shopping?

i do. i also cry in restaurants and at work and in the shower and to myself at night while falling asleep. or trying to. my heart soars when i see wedding ads. my heart cringes when i see someone wearing camo. my heart hurts when i think of distance and 100 days left. my heart smiles when i look down at my sparkly keepsake, a reminder that he will come home and we will be together, inseparable.

people make jokes that say, you miss her now, but wait until you have to see her everyday. and he says, it’s never gonna happen. i will never take you for granted and i will always cherish you.

he says, i can’t see what you’re wearing today or how your hair looks, but you’re beautiful to me everyday. when you feel bad because you’re bloated or that the pants you know are your size in a store don’t fit, you are upset, but you think of him standing right there, telling you, you’re beautiful no matter what.

you imagine him next to you in your car, at home on the couch, walking down the street.

did you know that the simplest activities of everyday life become extraordinary because the one you love is by your side?

i didn’t, but i do now.

he says, this will be the most difficult thing we ever have to go through, and don’t give up, because we’re almost there. it’s already halfway through june. it’s going to be ok. i’ll always be there when you cry after all this is over.

you look forward to celebrating being a bride with your friends, but are aware that you will probably break down and cry sometime between present openings.

i don’t know how many people know these things, but i wish more did. it would be easier to suffer. misery loves company and such. my only company is still my best friend, separated from me by 7 hours of time difference and a big ocean and lots of sand.

i wonder how quickly 100 days can come and go. if God has mercy on us, the answer is very.

about memories.

I think of you as next to me.

I talk to you and think of what you would say back.

I imagine your touch on my face.

I dream of your kiss.

I remember the moments we shared.

My Heart hurts that you’re so far.

It screams out for you to come back.

“You shouldn’t be so far away. Please…”

My Mind remembers your smell.

The sound of your voice.

Your intricacies and movements.

Mind wants to experience them again.

My Hands wish to touch you.

To feel your arms around me.

My Soul wants it’s mate back.

My Eyes think of everything the rest of Me wants, and flow tears.