bikini body/bikini ATTITUDE

A friend posted this on facebook, and it was PERFECT for how I've been feeling lately!

When I was 15, I could eat junk all day and was literally so thin people I didn't know would ask me if I was anorexic.  In gym class sophomore year, we were measuring our body fat with calipers and a girl I didn't even know came over and asked if anyone had 0% body fat.  My group of friends and I told her no and she looked at me and said, "oh, we thought maybe you did."  I was close to 6 feet tall, weighed no more than 145 (getting sick sophomore year took care of that and brought me down to the low 130s for the rest of high school), had thighs so skinny I couldn't MAKE them touch, and ate horrendously.  People TELL you it won't be like that forever and that you just have high metabolism, but you don't realize how much and how quickly things change.  (For the record I was completely obsessive about having a skinny waist and would wake up at 5 in the morning to do abs of steel workouts- all this after one little comment by my mom when I was 12 that I was getting a little bit of chunk at my waist.  At 5'9" and 115 pounds or so, looking back I'm sure it was either pretty much nothing or she was completely kidding- but that comment stuck with me, well, forever.  So I did get a fair amount of exercise in high school, I also walked a LOT).  But, after I had my baby Trent, my body never went back.  Despite actually still being skinny and fit (maybe tipped the scales around 155) I was still OBSESSED with being skinnier.  I weighed a little more and my waist was one whole inch bigger than before and it drove me crazy.  After I had Taryn, I was just a bit heavier than before I got pregnant with her.  Then, when Taryn was about 2, I gained about 20 pounds.  I was heavier than I had ever been except when I was pregnant and I thought it was totally unacceptable.  I began eating better (at this point I wasn't exercising ever) and lost 25 pounds in a couple of months.  After I met Ryan I gained a little back.  Then I started exercising again and toned up.  Then I got a little flabby.  When we got married I weighed somewhere around 160-165.  I wore a bikini one day on our honeymoon and after we got the pictures I was appalled.  All I saw was my fat gut.  I asked him why he let me run around like that and to look how fat I looked.  He said, "I just see us on the beach."  Right after we got married, I was stressed out and still trying to handle this whole being a grown up thing and started gaining again.  Then I got obsessive about exercising.  If my weight fluctuated AT ALL it freaked me out.  Then I stopped caring.  Then about 4 years ago, I gained my holiday weight and could NOT get rid of it.  Then in the summer it just fell off for no reason I could figure.  Then I got pregnant with Taylor.  That 10 weeks I gained probably 8 pounds.  Too much.  The next couple of years were the same.  Pack on weight over the holidays.  Watch it disappear when the weather got warm despite no changes to diet or exercise.  In 2012, I gained my holiday weight.  But it never went away in 2013.  In fact, the scale just kept creeping up and up.  My clothes were tight, I'd look in the mirror and think I was disgusting.  My tummy was flabby for the first time in many, many years (even after babies, I'd work hard to get at least a 4 pack back).  My thighs wouldn't NOT touch.  Mind you, at 6'1"ish and still under 180, I'm NOT huge.  But my head tells me I am.  So one of the goals I have this year is an either/or.  EITHER I'll lose weight- HOPEFULLY from eating healthfully, so that whatever chronic disease is plaguing me and making me feel terrible all the time will go away and a logical side effect will be weight loss, OR I'll "get over" my weight gain and JUST MAKE PEACE WITH HOW I LOOK.  I want to wear a bikini this year; just not with the stipulation of only doing so if I'm fit and look skinny.  I want to put on a bikini and not compare myself to EVERY. OTHER. WOMAN. I. SEE.  I want to put on a bikini and not CARE if I don't have a 6 pack- or even a 4 pack- or even a 2 pack!  I want to put on a bikini and know that the 20000000000000000000000000000 stretch marks I have are from the 4 babies who lived in there and not care if they're noticeable.  I want to put on a bikini and know there's nothing wrong with the body I'm in- whether it's 175 pounds or 155 pounds or any other NUMBER of pounds.  I don't know how I'm going to get to this point, but that's my goal.  And to not say how fat I am in front of my kids.  We shouldn't be judging any woman by her size, and I shouldn't be teaching them to by tearing myself apart.  My body can earn a black belt, care for my family, and take my dog for a walk.  It can house children.  All those things should be good enough!  I just have to get to the point where I always think those things ARE good enough- about myself and any other woman, bikini-clad or not.