The baby made me fat

What not to wear.Ok seriously this is one of my favorite shows on TLC. I love the makeovers and the way people glow once put into pretty well fitted clothes. It is like a light is clicked on and they feel not just better, but really more themselves. The self they forgot about years ago in pursuit of other goals wether career or family.

In college someone asked me if all my family was like me.

Basically meaning: really into clothes etc. and makeup and of coarse my reply was NO.

I think they had meant it to be negative, but I hadn't taken it that way at the time and I am grateful to have grown up in a family where being well manicured was important, but money was tight. I grew up in a family where the matriarch was always dressed well and face on (make up that is).

I expected myself to be that way when I had kids (doesn't every mom want to be the pretty, nice mom that people want to visit with?) I didnt' realize it would take about 2 years to get closer to my expectation.

Fluctuating with so much weight the past 7 years between hormones, pregnancy, depression and overeating I have learned that Darn it I can like myself for the way I am. But it took a lot of tears and self pity to get to it.

I today read an article in a fashion magazine about someone struggling with the last 5lbs. (Oh bother 5lbs!) so they would look great in the Vickie's bikini they had just ordered.

And I realized while and as I was reading it "Get over yourself". Woopidi doo dah. Stretch marks and cellulite and hanging parts have nothing on 5lbs.

By the end of the article it mentioned workout to stay healthy not lose weight, but having a weight goal will never be satisfying because you will always want to do 'better' or lose more.

I am not going to be that person who goes the rest of my life feeling sorry for myself for the choices I have made (Having children, not working out all the time, and eating what I want).

My great friend T from Livermore whom I recently got to visit said, "Gosh the way you talked I thought you were going to be huge-you look great!"

Meaning my blog complaining about the extra weight I had and the struggle to stiffen my jiggle that I blab about.

And I am so glad she said that because afterward I thought, "She is right...it did sound like I was ginormous" And even if I feel that way. Most of the time what we feel about ourselves isn't true (especially the negative).

I want to be more toned. I have given up the mentality of "IF only I could wake up and be 123lbs again"

Don't get me wrong there are still times where I think it would be nice if that could magically happen, but I am not basing my happiness, or what I think my life would be like if I was there again.

Looking back at pictures after having my first baby I wore big clothes, pajamas and anything comfy that flowed away from my body. Not becoming or attractive on me.

I didn't realize at the time when my mother scolded me for wearing men's clothes and informed me that I wasn't allowed to take my husbands pajamas anymore that she was doing me a service.

While competitively speaking in college I learned "Look good, feel good" all is in perspective of coarse. College, before the child bearing days (yes I base my timeline on this)

So when I see people who wear scroungy ill fitted clothes and seem to not care at all about their appearance, or the way items fit them I always think "Do they really not value themselves enough to do so?"



So I pose a question to whomever might come across my rant to ask yourself

"Am I feeling frumpy because that is how I dress and act about myself?"

Then ask

"Do you dress your personality?" "Are you frumpy because you really are a dull boring person who doesn't care about your worth?"

Well you are just going to have to get over it, or as my mom would tell me "Well, that sounds like a PP, personal problem".

I am not going to be donning furs, or sporting the obnoxious skinny jean, but I am investing in myself.

To not have so many put downs, to wear clothes that fit well and to be proud of this somewhat mauled body of mine. And yes at a current heavier and less toned size I can buy a hot pair of jeans full price, why punish yourself for being what you are right now?

Sure I dont' have the perky emblems of pre baby, or the tummy of a teenager. I have been noticing wrinkles (which I am blaming on Andrew), but really Mariah get over yourself and enjoy what you have in life.

Because really in the end the Baby made me fat.








Proud point for me:

I don't wear board shorts to the beach anymore. I have for the past 13 years and it took having a baby less tone, more to squeeze into spandex, and a tummy scar to realize:

1. I am not that important that people need to look at me and snap pictures of my 'faults'
2. There is a good feeling that comes with being the only one in a one piece at the beach who isn't afraid of the snow white thighs. I am what I am.