Tattoos.

I got a tattoo.

Taadaa! Right now I am sitting with a bag of ice on it because my leg is sooo swollen. Yes, that is my leg. I am so happy about it. I have been wanting to get this tattoo for a while now but until recently I wasn't sure what image it needed. I was so happy when I finally figured it out. A few people think it is a "sewing tattoo"...cute. But no, its not. If you know me just by looking at it you can figure it out, its very straight forward. It basically is how what I see in the mirror, what society and I tell myself is broken, there is no "standard model" and I don't need to keep measuring myself up to something that is so f*ed up.
I am the kind of girl who likes to tattoo the truths I know about myself so I don't forget them. This on is very personal and its taken me a while to be able to be open about it all. I still struggle with this on a regular basis and almost daily basis so it's even harder to be open. When I get dressed I look in the mirror and some days I see me as I am and other days I see this person who isn't enough and never will be. Never pretty enough, thin enough, unique enough, fun enough, and for some reason I believe it. Most days I believe it. I know that having Shiloh has helped so much but made it all so much harder. I know when he looks at me he doesn't see me how I see myself. He is all love and adoration. When I look in his eyes all I see is this love that I will never understand and could never live without. I forget how I feel and what I think I look like, because I have him. I HAD him. That should be enough to make me love everything about myself and my body, I was given this beautiful child to bring into the world and my body was able to do it. I mean, geez, I pushed a freaking baby out of my you know what....that's pretty amazing. But then I see how I have changed since before I got pregnant, my bigger boobs, barely wider hips, not so flat and toned belly and I just hate it all. I can't wear over half of my clothes anymore because my body is not what it was but I hate it so much. I "feel like I still look 3 months pregnant". I spend all my time wishing I looked like a did last summer when I was so cute with my tiny boobs and flat belly. I talk about how I want to wear my old jeans all the time. I refuse to buy a new pair even though these ones probably won't ever fit me again. They are like half a size too small. I hold on to them because I want to be "motivated" to get back to "pre-preggo Cali" again. Then I remember, I can't wear them because I am not that girl anymore. I think that after having a baby I am not a "girl" anymore at all. I am a woman who HAD A BABY 3 1/2 months ago. If anything I should be amazed that I look how I do now(I need some serious body love)! Magazines and books attack us as women, praying on our insecurities with ideas of how to "get your best body" "walk your way slim" "eat what you love and still lose" "flat abs fast!", I know because these are all articles in the magazines I can't help but buy. As a new mom I feel particularly attacked by the world that I need to be back in my pre-baby jeans, that the person I've become isn't "right". Pregnancy changes you and it should be embraced, we shouldn't be ashamed to hid because we don't look like Gisele, Heidi or Angelina after they had their babies. I'm sorry I don't have personal trainer to help me get back into shape. I know this is sort of a rant, but there is truth in it, at least to me. I need to write things out and talk about them in order for me to realized everything that is going on in my life. All of this has been building since I started reading this book "The Cult of Thinness" by Sharlene Nagy Hesse-Biber. It's a sort of feminist book about all the influences that have created this "perfect body" that women are told to be. It's interesting. It makes me mad reading it though. I realize how screwed up our world is, it devourers our individuality and spits out this diet crazy army who will stop at nothing to "be thin". I am proud that I am finding my way out of that black hole. I know I'm not out yet, I still struggle all the time but I am working on it. I love my life as a mom and a wife too much to want to go back to my selfish ways. One day, I want to wake up and put on clothes and not change them multiple times throughout the day because I don't feel pretty or thin enough.