We Are Beautiful

I love my baby. I love everything about her. From her bowed legs to her double chin to her massive belly and stinky toes. As her mother I feel I have rights to say she is the cutest baby in the world! Her new tricks are sucking on her tongue like a binky, doing crunches trying to sit up, and drooling bubbles all the time. She is one chubby baby and I love it.

Wait a minute. Why are these traits considered adorable in infants and toddlers but not in adults? Having bowed legs and a double chin are not necessarily perceived as good traits to have in our generation. Somehow as our brains develop to full capacity, we also learn a fault. We learn that their is one way to look and if we or anyone differs, we judge or try to change the differences.

I understand completely how difficult it can be as a pregnant woman to feel beautiful or even sexy. Now after the pregnancy, as I recover, I know again how difficult and frustrating it can be to not have "better" body. Apparently it takes a lot longer than a couple months to lose all the weight gained during pregnancy.

This is a problem I face and I have decided to do something about it. Sure, my body's not what it used to be, but why can it not still be beautiful?

I love the artists that capture the beauty of the body. Not a "perfect" body developed by our imperfect minds, but all the different kinds of bodies in the world. Whatever the size or shape or features, these artists have unlearned the fault of judgment and show the beauty in each of our differences.

And our differences are beautiful!

I do not want my daughter to grow up wishing she had different legs or ears or nose or butt. But how do I teach her to love herself and her appearance with the world constantly bombarding us with the "perfect" look that does not even exist?

The best solution I could come up with was to change myself. Not my appearance in anyway, but my own mind. I have to change the way I see myself. I have to stare at my own stretch-marked legs and tell myself they are beautiful until I finally believe it. I have to ignore the alarms that go off in my head, pointing out the gut I still have from my giant pregnant belly and instead think of how wonderful it is to fit in all my shirts again. I need to believe my husband every time he tells me how good I look and especially when he tells me I am sexy. Even with my giant butt and thick ankles and extra skin on my stomach, I need to learn to love my body, to think of myself as beautiful.

Children listen, but mostly they watch. And if I can show (and tell) my baby Elli as she grows that I love my body with its "imperfections", then she will learn to love hers as well.

I know she will be just as beautiful in twenty years as she is now, and I hope to teach her to believe that. I hope that all women learn that they are beautiful. Stretch marks and love handles are the aftermaths of love and sacrifice, of bearing our children into this world. Therefore these features are some of the most beautiful in the world, and should never be discredited, especially by ourselves.