these things I can accept

I'm so sick and tired of tearing myself apart for my shortcomings. No one is perfect. No one looks perfect, no one says just the right thing all the time or is able to keep her to do list done before vegging in front of the tv.

Here's the deal: We, as women, have struggled ever since the Victorian age to be seen as human, right? We want equal rights, we want our voices heard, and we no longer try to portray this image of ourselves that is unnatural. We no longer expect ourselves to be Donna Reid - perfect dress (with a crinoline, of course) perfect apron, perfect coif, smile, nails while cleaning up after our messy noisy men. We're telling our husbands, boyfriends, fathers, sons & friends, "Look - we're real!"

So we might have convinced our guys that imperfections are what's really beautiful, but why aren't we covincing ourselves? As I look at other women, I can see the beauty in many of them. Sarah Jessica Parker, while a completely gorgeous woman with a kickin sense of style, isn't exactly your typical beauty. And yet I love her. It's not her perfections that make her beautiful to me, it's her quarky inperfections. The list could go on and on. But stops when I look into the mirror.

There are days that I look in the mirror and think, "Well, you do have a cute nose and pretty eyes...". In fact, I had one of those moments this morning. That all came crashing down when I looked at a picture of me on my sister's myspace. I didn't like my face at all. I didn't like anything about the picture - and it wasn't half bad.

So I'm tired of it. I'm tired of perpetuating this self-loathing that surrounds all woman. High self-esteem or low, we all do it. And the Buck stops here.

These are the things that I'm going to accept, nay celebrate, about myself from now on:
(if, when reading this you find it horribly narsassitic, then blah you. It is narsassistic because it's about me. It's my blog. :o) )

1. I can't take a good picture for the life of me. Because a still photograph has a hard time capturing what's pretty about me. It's not one second of my life but all my past, present, and future and all the ways that it's made me me. That's my real beauty.

2. I will forever sing constantly and annoy my husband.

3. I will never have the time, patience, or gumption to have a rock hard body. My arms may always be a little flabby. So what? Just don't wear a sleeveless shirt. Problem solved.

4. I will always love junk food. Eating healthy foods will never become my choice. I will do it because it is healthy for me and my family, and I will enjoy eating these healthy foods, but I will always enjoy junk more. I can either eat junk 24/7 and be 240 again, or I can eat healthy foods and be slimmer. I choose to walk the line and just be regular size. Not fat nor thin. The average person doesn't even label me as either one now. I'm just normal size. I'm realizing that woman I think are skinnier than me are actually my size. I was down about my weight last Friday and Jeremy said, "No one thinks anything about your size but you". And he's right. My mom has been saying stuff recently like, "Just don't go too far..." and I realize now that it's because she sees that I have an unhealthy view of myself. And it's this low body image that's making me yo-yo (even if it is just a few pounds right now) I've blogged about this before, but it didn't stick. I'm sticking it now.

5. I'm not going to keep my house perfectly clean. My cooking won't taste as good as Jeremy's momma's (because I dont' cook with lard...) and my children may not always look or act perfectly, but I'm already a dang good wife and I will be a great mother. Because I love my husband and I already love my children enough to keep trying until I get it right. My family doesn't need perfection from me - they just need the best me they can get. And if I'm constantly thrashing myself for not always getting it right then they can't get the best of me. Besides, if I don't let my family see my faults then they might grow up expecting the same perfection from themselves and then they'll have the same mental trauma that I have. :o)

So I'm going to start loving myself more and expecting less. I'm going to lose down to 175 because that's what I've decided was a good weight for me, but I'm going to buy whatever size 175 is. If it's a 40W then I'm going to buy it. Because I know that I look pretty good at this weight, and if I keep trying to achieve perfection then it's never gonna happen. I'm going to keep active, exercise moderately, and take some of the time I spend in front of the mirror hating what I see and spend that time learning something that I want to know. I bet I could learn to knit in the time I spend putting myself down. Wouldn't it be a lot cooler to be able to make my own scarves than it would be to keep being my own worse critic?