Dear Body,
As we approach our 48th anniversary together, I realize that you are my longest long-term relationship. I want you to know that after all the crap we have been through together, all the years that I hated you and wanted a divorce, all the years that I abused you and put you in unsafe situations and then all these years of healing both you, me, us together, I am totally in love with you. And the miracle of all miracles is that you forgive me my transgressions against you and love me back. My gratitude to you for this forgiveness and for your not leaving me during those hard, long years is profound. And it truly feels like a miracle.
It is so weird to be middle aged and feel more alive and vibrant in you than I did throughout my entire 30's. Your willingness to participate in losing 50 lbs and helping me joyfully become a "person who exercises" is a gift beyond measure. I am so proud of you for daring and for plodding through the beginning of the changes; sometimes literally one step at a time, one footfall and then a whole lot later, the next footfall. You were so clear with me through all of this and I am so grateful for your unambiguous voice that helped me learn how to make good choices and treat you right. I haven't forgotten those years of digestive distress and the horrible pain you were in so much of the time. And all I needed to do was be willing to change. Weight Watchers was the frame, but you were my biggest teacher through all of this. From the second day of Weight Watchers, over 4 years ago, you stopped hurting all the time. I posited that it was the fat in my diet and although never diagnosed, it must have been that your gallbladder was unhappy and trying to quit her job. But all she really needed was the huge amount of fat I was throwing at her to be reduced and she quieted down and to this day is functional and happy.
Thank you for that!
I am in awe of your courage to get smaller. Getting smaller is a very scary thing. I really get that. But you kept talking to me through the two year process. You told me when you were scared. You told me when you needed to stop right here for a while and even if those "whiles" were months and months through our two years of helping you become smaller, when you were ready; when we'd worked out the old stories and released them, you willingly continued down the path to weight loss. I am sorry for the times I got frustrated and mad at you for stalling. I am sorry for the times I have pushed you too hard because I had an agenda and you were asking me to step off my linear path for a bit. And more gratitude for that day when we were walking home from a hike and you said that we needed to reconfigure our power structure from one of hierarchy where head was at the top and ruled body, to a consensus model where head and body were a partnership and both had power but neither had power over. You asked me for partnership and so much fell away that was not needed. From the moment that the model shifted in me, I stopped being frustrated and angry at you. And I could feel you respond to that by feeling safer and being so very willing, so sweetly willing to continue in the weight loss, fitness, health dance with me.
Dear Body, for 2 1/2 years now I've had such a crush on you. Tara teases me about it still. She catches me admiring you in the mirror and tells me I'm such a teenager. And Blessed Be for that! When you were in your teenage years I hated you for the most part. I'm so grateful that you have engaged with me in all the "do overs" we have had over these past 2 1/2 years. Getting to be that innocent raw teenager again with a whole lot of self-esteem and self-love is such a different movie than the one we lived through all those years ago. And do you know what I'm the most crushed out on? On your arms. Those gorgeous yoga arms that I always despaired would always look doughy or big brutish, but now have such lovely defined muscles. I love your beautiful belly with that sixpack sitting right under the surface, right under that baby sag that is your badge of honor for carrying and birthing a nine pound baby 26 years ago. I'm crushed out on your hourglass waist to hips. I'm crushed out by your breasts, your ribcage, your strong back and your beautiful, aging face. Even your ass, which was the shame of my whole life is sexy looking and inspires my crush.
I'm having another interesting experience in beholding you: For two years you were losing fat, gaining muscle and totally changing shape. That was what I saw. You've been relatively the same size now for over two years and holding at relatively the same fitness level for those two years and I'm finally seeing you age which is something I missed during the losing years because everything was changing at the same time. But now I am noticing your aging process and Dear Body, let me say: You are aging well. Yes we have middle aged aches and pains. Yes, there is almost always something that hurts or aches or feels somewhat restricted, but after all the years of inactivity and obesity, I know many different kinds of physical pain and these pains are the pains of a body that works hard and is a child of gravity; the Mother of us all that holds us to Her body for our whole lives, pulling parts of us towards Her as we age until she takes us back into Herself. And after almost 48 years, you hold yourself so tall and straight! Your feet gracefully dance on this Earth with all Her love and gravity, but you run and jump and dance and fly, you balance on one foot with ease and the aches and pains you share with me are those of an active healthy body and are so very bearable. In fact, they remind me that I have you and that I am alive, when I go into those dark places I still sometimes go where I forget. Thank goddess I don't forget for long or very often anymore. And I know I have you to always remind me that you and I are a team and will be for the rest of our life together.
Dear Body, I want to recognize how resilient you are. It's been 3 1/2 years since we started going to yoga class and developing a regular practice. And in the continuum of that practice, I am so pleased and gratified at how far you've come in the strengthening and flexibility departments. To finally have a core that can hold and protect that hyperflexibility has turned that hyperflexibility from a liability to a great asset. I'm so thrilled at what I can do that I couldn't do six months or a year or two years ago. And your cardio vascular health? Wow. Just wow! I remember being the girlscout who got winded on the bike trip we took up Round Swamp road. We lived in the flattest place compared to Northern California; Long Island where the highest point was about 100 ft above sea level, and I got winded riding my bike up what now would look like a mere rise, not the mountain that it was to me then as a kid. I remember the fear of not being able to find my breath, someone giving me a paper bag and then the shame of it all. And no, we don't ride a bike but we hike up hills that a person who is not fit would struggle to reach the top of. I remember when you started doing those hills with me. When we would get home, that would be it for the rest of the day. We'd need a nap. Now it's something we do together a few times a week, come home after and just go on with our day.
I love your inner Labrador Retriever and your inner horse. I love how those parts of you rose to the surface with the coming of fitness. And I love how you love to exercise and it's not this negotiation we have to have every day. I love that "throw the ball" feeling or that "Let's gallop down this trail" feeling. You know that this is good for you. And you also know when it's not a good idea and I thank you again for being so clear in your communications with me that when you want a day of rest, you tell me and I listen. And I've learned that a day of rest doesn't mean that it becomes 2 days or more. It doesn't mean that I've blown my exercise program. It does mean that my agenda driven self has to step off my linear path and honor you and your wisdom.
Body, I love your abilities to feel pleasure as well as pain, because pain is a warning that helps me protect both of us. I love your hands and all the thousands of things that they can do. I love your abilities to see and hear, taste and smell. I love your ability to feel so many different sensations. I love your ability to cry and to laugh, to get angry, to be sad. I love your hard work in shedding a lining every month and how you taught me how to take care of you around my menstruation so that it is fairly painless and a happy and good experience. Since Mom bled until she was 53, I'm hoping that we get to do this part of the dance for at least a few more years. I do so dearly love that moon that waxes and wanes inside of you.
I am regularly grateful at your role modeling of cause and effect. At your lack of ambiguity. You are stimulated. You respond. There's no confusion or processing. There is this complex simplicity of cause and effect, stimulus and response. After so many years of living mostly in my head this is very important role modeling for me. You live in the here and now and you teach me daily to do the same or at least strive to it. I knew that "here and now" is where my power is, but the head knowing is so very different from the body knowing and I thank you for that.
After most of a lifetime of abusing and hating you, your willingness to let me in to live inside of you for the first time since childhood leaves me shaky and in tears. What other beloved would be so generous? Thank you for that in ways that I can't even express in words. Thank you for your steadfast hold on the Life Force. Thank you for being my most important teacher. Thank you for not hating me back or punishing me for our past. You live so here and now and in this here and now I am totally in love with you and I hope you find me kind and worthy of your partnership.
Dear Body, it could have gone so differently for us, but magic happened and we both rolled up our proverbial sleeves and look where we've gotten to! Thank you from the bottom of my heart to the bottom of yours. Here's to many many many more happy years together. May I continue to be worthy of you.
Love,
Maddy
As we approach our 48th anniversary together, I realize that you are my longest long-term relationship. I want you to know that after all the crap we have been through together, all the years that I hated you and wanted a divorce, all the years that I abused you and put you in unsafe situations and then all these years of healing both you, me, us together, I am totally in love with you. And the miracle of all miracles is that you forgive me my transgressions against you and love me back. My gratitude to you for this forgiveness and for your not leaving me during those hard, long years is profound. And it truly feels like a miracle.
It is so weird to be middle aged and feel more alive and vibrant in you than I did throughout my entire 30's. Your willingness to participate in losing 50 lbs and helping me joyfully become a "person who exercises" is a gift beyond measure. I am so proud of you for daring and for plodding through the beginning of the changes; sometimes literally one step at a time, one footfall and then a whole lot later, the next footfall. You were so clear with me through all of this and I am so grateful for your unambiguous voice that helped me learn how to make good choices and treat you right. I haven't forgotten those years of digestive distress and the horrible pain you were in so much of the time. And all I needed to do was be willing to change. Weight Watchers was the frame, but you were my biggest teacher through all of this. From the second day of Weight Watchers, over 4 years ago, you stopped hurting all the time. I posited that it was the fat in my diet and although never diagnosed, it must have been that your gallbladder was unhappy and trying to quit her job. But all she really needed was the huge amount of fat I was throwing at her to be reduced and she quieted down and to this day is functional and happy.
Thank you for that!
I am in awe of your courage to get smaller. Getting smaller is a very scary thing. I really get that. But you kept talking to me through the two year process. You told me when you were scared. You told me when you needed to stop right here for a while and even if those "whiles" were months and months through our two years of helping you become smaller, when you were ready; when we'd worked out the old stories and released them, you willingly continued down the path to weight loss. I am sorry for the times I got frustrated and mad at you for stalling. I am sorry for the times I have pushed you too hard because I had an agenda and you were asking me to step off my linear path for a bit. And more gratitude for that day when we were walking home from a hike and you said that we needed to reconfigure our power structure from one of hierarchy where head was at the top and ruled body, to a consensus model where head and body were a partnership and both had power but neither had power over. You asked me for partnership and so much fell away that was not needed. From the moment that the model shifted in me, I stopped being frustrated and angry at you. And I could feel you respond to that by feeling safer and being so very willing, so sweetly willing to continue in the weight loss, fitness, health dance with me.
Dear Body, for 2 1/2 years now I've had such a crush on you. Tara teases me about it still. She catches me admiring you in the mirror and tells me I'm such a teenager. And Blessed Be for that! When you were in your teenage years I hated you for the most part. I'm so grateful that you have engaged with me in all the "do overs" we have had over these past 2 1/2 years. Getting to be that innocent raw teenager again with a whole lot of self-esteem and self-love is such a different movie than the one we lived through all those years ago. And do you know what I'm the most crushed out on? On your arms. Those gorgeous yoga arms that I always despaired would always look doughy or big brutish, but now have such lovely defined muscles. I love your beautiful belly with that sixpack sitting right under the surface, right under that baby sag that is your badge of honor for carrying and birthing a nine pound baby 26 years ago. I'm crushed out on your hourglass waist to hips. I'm crushed out by your breasts, your ribcage, your strong back and your beautiful, aging face. Even your ass, which was the shame of my whole life is sexy looking and inspires my crush.
I'm having another interesting experience in beholding you: For two years you were losing fat, gaining muscle and totally changing shape. That was what I saw. You've been relatively the same size now for over two years and holding at relatively the same fitness level for those two years and I'm finally seeing you age which is something I missed during the losing years because everything was changing at the same time. But now I am noticing your aging process and Dear Body, let me say: You are aging well. Yes we have middle aged aches and pains. Yes, there is almost always something that hurts or aches or feels somewhat restricted, but after all the years of inactivity and obesity, I know many different kinds of physical pain and these pains are the pains of a body that works hard and is a child of gravity; the Mother of us all that holds us to Her body for our whole lives, pulling parts of us towards Her as we age until she takes us back into Herself. And after almost 48 years, you hold yourself so tall and straight! Your feet gracefully dance on this Earth with all Her love and gravity, but you run and jump and dance and fly, you balance on one foot with ease and the aches and pains you share with me are those of an active healthy body and are so very bearable. In fact, they remind me that I have you and that I am alive, when I go into those dark places I still sometimes go where I forget. Thank goddess I don't forget for long or very often anymore. And I know I have you to always remind me that you and I are a team and will be for the rest of our life together.
Dear Body, I want to recognize how resilient you are. It's been 3 1/2 years since we started going to yoga class and developing a regular practice. And in the continuum of that practice, I am so pleased and gratified at how far you've come in the strengthening and flexibility departments. To finally have a core that can hold and protect that hyperflexibility has turned that hyperflexibility from a liability to a great asset. I'm so thrilled at what I can do that I couldn't do six months or a year or two years ago. And your cardio vascular health? Wow. Just wow! I remember being the girlscout who got winded on the bike trip we took up Round Swamp road. We lived in the flattest place compared to Northern California; Long Island where the highest point was about 100 ft above sea level, and I got winded riding my bike up what now would look like a mere rise, not the mountain that it was to me then as a kid. I remember the fear of not being able to find my breath, someone giving me a paper bag and then the shame of it all. And no, we don't ride a bike but we hike up hills that a person who is not fit would struggle to reach the top of. I remember when you started doing those hills with me. When we would get home, that would be it for the rest of the day. We'd need a nap. Now it's something we do together a few times a week, come home after and just go on with our day.
I love your inner Labrador Retriever and your inner horse. I love how those parts of you rose to the surface with the coming of fitness. And I love how you love to exercise and it's not this negotiation we have to have every day. I love that "throw the ball" feeling or that "Let's gallop down this trail" feeling. You know that this is good for you. And you also know when it's not a good idea and I thank you again for being so clear in your communications with me that when you want a day of rest, you tell me and I listen. And I've learned that a day of rest doesn't mean that it becomes 2 days or more. It doesn't mean that I've blown my exercise program. It does mean that my agenda driven self has to step off my linear path and honor you and your wisdom.
Body, I love your abilities to feel pleasure as well as pain, because pain is a warning that helps me protect both of us. I love your hands and all the thousands of things that they can do. I love your abilities to see and hear, taste and smell. I love your ability to feel so many different sensations. I love your ability to cry and to laugh, to get angry, to be sad. I love your hard work in shedding a lining every month and how you taught me how to take care of you around my menstruation so that it is fairly painless and a happy and good experience. Since Mom bled until she was 53, I'm hoping that we get to do this part of the dance for at least a few more years. I do so dearly love that moon that waxes and wanes inside of you.
I am regularly grateful at your role modeling of cause and effect. At your lack of ambiguity. You are stimulated. You respond. There's no confusion or processing. There is this complex simplicity of cause and effect, stimulus and response. After so many years of living mostly in my head this is very important role modeling for me. You live in the here and now and you teach me daily to do the same or at least strive to it. I knew that "here and now" is where my power is, but the head knowing is so very different from the body knowing and I thank you for that.
After most of a lifetime of abusing and hating you, your willingness to let me in to live inside of you for the first time since childhood leaves me shaky and in tears. What other beloved would be so generous? Thank you for that in ways that I can't even express in words. Thank you for your steadfast hold on the Life Force. Thank you for being my most important teacher. Thank you for not hating me back or punishing me for our past. You live so here and now and in this here and now I am totally in love with you and I hope you find me kind and worthy of your partnership.
Dear Body, it could have gone so differently for us, but magic happened and we both rolled up our proverbial sleeves and look where we've gotten to! Thank you from the bottom of my heart to the bottom of yours. Here's to many many many more happy years together. May I continue to be worthy of you.
Love,
Maddy
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3 comments:
What an absolutely beautiful, fabulous letter!! Thank you so much for hunting out my blog and showing me the way to your heartfelt and sincere celebration of your body.
Maddy--- what a beautiful letter. Thank you for sharing it--- it gives me hope that someday, I can have a similar relationship with my body. We're growing (figuratively, that it!) together--we have a long way to go, but we'll get there...
So positive. Thanks for sharing! I really enjoyed this.
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