The Day After
2015-Feb-16, Monday 08:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
I woke up with an excess of fatigue today, which is pretty standard for me at this point, but I tried to blame it on all the self analysis of yesterday. I swear, by the time I was finished and had everything posted I was ready to eat my a horse and sleep for twelve hours and today I felt hung over for the first few hours of being awake. It wound up being a fairly productive day.
For the most part.
I caught myself intentionally avoiding mirrors and thinking unkind things at myself today while being out and about. It made me sad because I have not yet put together my plan of attack for how to counteract those horrible behavior patterns. Since I wasn't sure what to do, but I didn't want to just keep hating on myself, I tried to focus on something that made me feel good. It helped for a little while, but I am aware that this is not a long term solution. I think the important thing at this stage is to notice the negative thoughts and behaviors and interrupt them. As I move through this experience, I will come up with concrete positive substitutes, but this will have to work for now.
and it's okay. I'm okay.
In the car with my pretend mom when we left Target, the kiddo started talking about her belly, about how it's big and she doesn't like it. I died. and in my secret zombie form I told her she was beautiful. I reminded her that we are beginning to exercise and eat healthier and that in the mean time we need to find ways to be okay with our bodies the way they are now. It kinda fell flat because I didn't have any ideas on how to go about doing that.
We got dropped off at a friend's house and I asked her and she sent me a link ( http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Feverydaylife.globalpost.com%2Factivities-building-positive-selfimages-teens-5260.html&h=2AQHrg-s5) so that gives me a place to start, although the article is pretty specific about how to address different things with different genders, which is total bullshit, and also is just rampant with unchecked privilege of the "buy them something to make them feel better" variety. I can still use some of the information as a place to start. I can also watch all the body positive spoken word with her and share the things I learn through this process as they come up.
What I can't do is go back in time and erase all of the times that she heard me say horrible things about myself. I can't go back and force myself out of bed and cook her healthy meals instead of microwave burritos and I can't change the fact that for years we really weren't doing much in the way of physical activity because we were both so used to accommodating my depression, anxiety, and agoraphobia. I accepted the reality of the world that I created, which was that I was too sick and too broken to be a functional human and take care of us in very basic and very important ways. I taught my daughter how to be kind to every living being, except herself. I really hope that I can find ways to teach her about all of the wonderful things that I fucked up or left out.
I want her to know that she matters.
that she is smart
that she is funny and fun to be around
that she is strong and creative and wonderful
I want her to know that she smells like graham crackers and sunshine and that that smell always makes me smile.
I want her to know that her belly is beautiful and her stretch marks do not diminish her value as a human being.
I want to be able to tell her exactly what to do when she starts to feel bad about herself, but I can't because I haven't gotten that far yet.
I want her to know that I love her and I want that feeling to be contagious.
So, tomorrow I get back to work researching more methods to combat deep-seeded self-loathing and replace it with radical unapologetic self-love. I hope she's paying attention. and I hope some of it rubs off.
For the most part.
I caught myself intentionally avoiding mirrors and thinking unkind things at myself today while being out and about. It made me sad because I have not yet put together my plan of attack for how to counteract those horrible behavior patterns. Since I wasn't sure what to do, but I didn't want to just keep hating on myself, I tried to focus on something that made me feel good. It helped for a little while, but I am aware that this is not a long term solution. I think the important thing at this stage is to notice the negative thoughts and behaviors and interrupt them. As I move through this experience, I will come up with concrete positive substitutes, but this will have to work for now.
and it's okay. I'm okay.
In the car with my pretend mom when we left Target, the kiddo started talking about her belly, about how it's big and she doesn't like it. I died. and in my secret zombie form I told her she was beautiful. I reminded her that we are beginning to exercise and eat healthier and that in the mean time we need to find ways to be okay with our bodies the way they are now. It kinda fell flat because I didn't have any ideas on how to go about doing that.
We got dropped off at a friend's house and I asked her and she sent me a link ( http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Feverydaylife.globalpost.com%2Factivities-building-positive-selfimages-teens-5260.html&h=2AQHrg-s5) so that gives me a place to start, although the article is pretty specific about how to address different things with different genders, which is total bullshit, and also is just rampant with unchecked privilege of the "buy them something to make them feel better" variety. I can still use some of the information as a place to start. I can also watch all the body positive spoken word with her and share the things I learn through this process as they come up.
What I can't do is go back in time and erase all of the times that she heard me say horrible things about myself. I can't go back and force myself out of bed and cook her healthy meals instead of microwave burritos and I can't change the fact that for years we really weren't doing much in the way of physical activity because we were both so used to accommodating my depression, anxiety, and agoraphobia. I accepted the reality of the world that I created, which was that I was too sick and too broken to be a functional human and take care of us in very basic and very important ways. I taught my daughter how to be kind to every living being, except herself. I really hope that I can find ways to teach her about all of the wonderful things that I fucked up or left out.
I want her to know that she matters.
that she is smart
that she is funny and fun to be around
that she is strong and creative and wonderful
I want her to know that she smells like graham crackers and sunshine and that that smell always makes me smile.
I want her to know that her belly is beautiful and her stretch marks do not diminish her value as a human being.
I want to be able to tell her exactly what to do when she starts to feel bad about herself, but I can't because I haven't gotten that far yet.
I want her to know that I love her and I want that feeling to be contagious.
So, tomorrow I get back to work researching more methods to combat deep-seeded self-loathing and replace it with radical unapologetic self-love. I hope she's paying attention. and I hope some of it rubs off.