Sometimes...

Sometimes, when I get out of the shower and no one is around, I dance naked to whatever song is stuck in my.  In that moment I feel as if I am 16 again.  My hair is no longer this golden brown color, but instead back to its natural wild red.  My stomach is flat, my hips a little less wide, and my eyes are lacking the bags that currently haunt them.  Some times I dance in the shower and relive pass moments of my life.  I day dream about the first kiss B and I shared replaying the moment over and over until my head is swimming like it did that day.  While I'm on the floor working out I can feel ever muscle working and in those moments I picture myself without the battle scars of pregnancy.  I see the shadows of my arms on the floor.  They look thin and toned.  I get so lost in what my body feels like that when I look in the mirror I am sometimes shocked at what I see.  Instead of smooth attractive curves, my hips are wide and plagued with fat that just doesn't want to melt away.  Instead of a flat stomach I see a saggy worn out thing.  Stretch marks cover my whole middle section reaching up to just under my breasts which when not full of milk for Sir E look deflated and sag.  I do not find myself beautiful when I look into the mirror.  But when B wraps his arms around me and kisses my neck, I feel beautiful.  When he groans from me innocently dropping my towel to get dressed, I feel beautiful.  When I catch his eyes lingering a little too long on my breasts, I feel beautiful.  I am not as young as I once was and now that it is too late I realize how much I took for granted my own beauty.  I considered myself fat for a very long time and it was all because I had a friend tell me I was fat because of how much I weighed.  I am tall and I was taller than she, my weight for my height was perfect.  My stomach was not hanging over the side of my jeans and though my hips were big it wasnt from fat.  However I believed her because she had the confidence to wear a bikini and not be a size 2.  I believed her because she was my friend and she would never lie to me like that.  I was fooled into believing that I was fat and because of that I did not think I was beautiful.  It wasnt until years later after our friendship had ended that I realized she was wrong.  When B and I got married I weighed what I am trying to weigh now.  Ive been putting in the hard work and have been receiving results.  A week ago I put on a pair of jeans I had not been able to wear for nearly 2 years.  That made me feel beautiful.  I am far from fat but I am not thin either.  Having 3 babies in roughly 4 years has done a lot of damage to my body and not just the outside.  My organs have repeatedly been forced up into my rib cage and crushed.  My muscles have been forced apart and my bones have been put to breaking force.  Emotionally I have been set into a constant whirl wind of roller coasters.  Feeling over joyous amounts of love to feeling as if no one could ever love me.  My marriage has been pushed to the breaking point and survived.  My body has been pushed to the breaking point and survived.  My body is no longer some beautiful innocent thing for men to desire.  Instead my body is a story.  Its a story of love, pain, torture, let down, surprise, torment, excitement, failure, and success.  Its an intertwining painting of the labors of my love for my children.  Its powerful, unique, a statement.  It is unlike anyone else, though it may appear as if it is similar.  My story is different as is every other women's out there.  That is what sets it apart and that is what sets us all apart.  I do put myself down some times with how I look, but I remind myself that change takes time.  Lady G turns 4 in May.  For 4 years I have not been able to get my body back.  My thyroid was part of the problem though I did not know how much apart until Lady L was almost 1.  Once I got that under control I became pregnant with Sir E before I even had time to start working out.  Now that Sir E is here (4 months of being here) I am trying very hard to get to where I want to be.  The changes are small but I notice them.  I notice them when I put on my clothes, when I glance in the mirror and the rare occasion that I step onto a scale.  In time my stomach will be flat, my hips will be curvy but attractive.  My body however will never be the same and I can live with that, because my body is what I sacrificed to have the three beautiful children that sit in front of me now.  My body is proof that I am a warrior.  My body is proof that I am strong.