Learning to Love Your Body after It Betrays You

While I wish this post was about the size of my jeans, it's not. It's not about what people see or how I feel in a bathing suit, it's about being betrayed over and over again.

After each loss, everyone assures you that it's "not your fault." And while it usually comes from a place of grace, it has been a one of the more difficult comments to stomach. It's my body rejecting the one thing it was designed to do. What do you mean it's not my fault? 

In my darkest moments, I find myself thinking, "Chris could have a baby if he was with a different woman, a woman who is not broken," or "My body will never be able to carry a baby full term." The thoughts are scary and sad but most of the time, I can push them to the back of my mind. 

Somewhere between grief and pushing negative thoughts out of my head, I have learned to love my body. And yes, it has failed me and it may be to blame for my consecutive miscarriages but this body, it's the only I got, I can't trade it in. 

So we have called a truce. 

While this body is not perfect it has allowed me to see beautiful faces, to hear I love you's, to run and travel to remarkable places. I have gone diving and climbed mountains in this body. I have cried and belly laughed in this body. I have scraped  knees and broken bones in this body. But most importantly, this faulty body, has made me a mother, three times. 

For all of these things and reasons not listed, I have trained myself to love the body God gave me, with all of its imperfections and flaws. Of course there are things I would change if I could, like my uterus, I will continue to choose to embrace every inch of this 26 year old body and give thanks for all that it has allowed me to do. 

-B