Jeans Getting Snug? Here's what to do about it.
My jeans are feeling a little snug. Not TOO snug, but they're sitting at the upper margins of "comfortable", and I know that if my body changes just a wee bit more, they are gonna start to hurt my feelings.
And when that happens... I'll have to move BUY NEW PANTS to the top of my priority list. I don't mean my "shopping" priority list. I mean my LIFE priority list.
Gals, you and I need pants that fit our bodies.
Buying pants to fit your body as it changes is not "giving in" or "giving up."
Buying pants to fit your body as it changes is a way of giving LOVE.
MY body has changed in the last month... which is to be expected, because I have a human body, and human bodies change.
Sometimes my body changes for no "good" reason.
Sometimes my body changes when I'm going through some-emotional-thing.
Sometimes my body changes because my routine changes.
Best I can figure, my body changed THIS TIME because my routines fell to shit around the holidays AND and I was nursing a couple of new injuries. Four months into my learn-how-to-do-a-cartwheel (FOR THE FIRST TIME IN MY LIFE) practice, I pulled my groin muscle something wicked AND got bursitis in my right wrist.
(Yes, it's true. I've NEVER in my life done a cartwheel. Not even when I was a kid. And at 45, I've decided to learn. Every week after my hip-hop class, I receive private cartwheel instruction from my dance teacher, Toni. It's scary, and embarrassing, and hard, and gets ALL the negative-voices-inside-my-head roaring their mighty roar. But I'm committed. Not ONLY because I want to learn how to do a cartwheel, but because it's a great lesson in going toe-to-toe with shame, and getting-over-my-damn-self.)
Between the cartwheel injuries and the holiday madness, I didn't dance OR practice my cartwheels OR go for a walk, not even once. (I DID get out for my weekly Sunday hikes, and squeeze in two dance-yoga classes at Kripalu during my teaching weekend, but I took it easy, and did a ton of stretching.)
MY BODY IS RESPONDING to my lack of movement and all of the yummy meals I ate around the holidays. And you know what... I'm not mad at my body for changing.
Why?
BECAUSE BODIES CHANGE. I worked my body a little too hard during my cartwheel practice, and it responded with injury. So I had to slow down. And when I slowed down, I gained a few pounds.
BIG DEAL.
Weight gain isn't something to fear. It doesn't mean you should feel ashamed of yourself.
Of course, that's not what we're taught. We're taught that if we gain weight, then we've failed - that we've "let ourselves go" - that we're lazy.
We're made to feel ASHAMED when our bodies change.
You guys. Bodies change.
They change for all kinds of reasons, whether we like it or not.
My body's job isn't to be pretty and to stay the same size.
My body's job is to be a human body.
MY JOB is to take care of my human body.
So that my body can take care of me.
For me, that means eating foods that make my body feel energized, hiking on Sundays, walking my kids to and from school, and going to dance class. It also means slowing down when I get an injury.
It doesn't mean pushing myself THROUGH an injury because I'm afraid of what will happen to my body if I stop moving/exercising. It doesn't mean obsessively restricting my food intake, and counting my calories while my body is healing. And when/if my pants become too small, it doesn't mean I'm going to punish my body by wearing too-small pants that squeeze my guts and make my crotch burn when I sit down because they're so tight!!
That's just... mean. That's what bullies do. And I refuse to be a bully to my body.
Yet... how many of you have done this?
I know, I have too. I used to do this ALL THE TIME. Not anymore though. I've wised up to the brainwashing tricks of the multi-bajillion-dollar-industrial-diet-complex that has, in the past, highjacked my good sense and convinced me that I should feel ashamed for "letting" my body change.
So here I am, in my today-body, wearing pants that I have filled to the brim, and feeling good about it; I'm making a conscious decision to honor my body as it changes... not punish it.
This is what unconditional (body) love "looks" like. And I threw "looks" in quotes there, because loving your body has NOTHING to do with what your body actually LOOKS like. It has to do with how you TREAT your body, not just when it's behaving the way you want it to, but when it's changing WITHOUT your express permission.
I wanna know... how do YOU honor your body when it changes? Is it something that comes easy for you? Or do you have to work at it?
I know I have to work at it, every damn day. But I gotta tell you, I think it's worth it.
#mybodyisnotaproblem #itstheculture
xo Stasia