High School Fat

Our first wedding anniversary is tomorrow.  Insane.  Life is going ridiculously fast and I don't foresee it slowing down any time soon.

Feeling a bit nostalgic about life, I was looking through some old photo albums and scrapbooks and somehow ended up perusing some high school yearbooks.  I was good at high school.  Lots of friends, lots of success, homecoming court... Pretty good indeed.  But, like a lot of high school girls, I spent all four years insecure about my weight.  I mean, I was a cheerleader for Pete's sake (is Pete an actual person here that requires a capital 'P'?)!  Cheerleaders are supposed to be thin and beautiful and super super fit.  Well, that wasn't me.  I was a normal sized girl with a normal sized waist and thighs and (gasp!) I even had a booty!!  All the while though, I felt huge and struggled on a daily basis with my body insecurities...

Today, I look back at these photos and think, "I wish I was "high school fat" again!"   Turns out, high school fat wasn't actually fat at all.  It was curvy.  Beautiful, actually...  Now, 13 years out of high school and 35 pounds heavier, I've embarked on finding my way back to high school fat. Diet.  Exercise.   Dedication and determination... An exhausting process but one that I'm proud of.  Working my butt off and down 14 pounds... pretty good for an "old lady", huh?

Here's what I've learned in the last 6 weeks of this process.  It's not about losing weight.  I mean, it is, of course, but... it's more... it's... it's about finding my way back to being secure in my body, my appearance, and the person that I am... a wife, a teacher, a daughter, sister, aunt... mostly importantly though, a princess.  The daughter of a King!  A King who created me to be exactly who I am and to love exactly WHO I am, including the flab on my arms and the jiggle in my thighs.  I'm learning.  Learning how to eat healthier, learning how to read my body, but most importantly, learning how to love myself, exactly the way I am.

My prayer is that we would all find this peace.  Young or old, skinny or fat, cheerleaders or band members, single or married...

^{Psalms 139}

¹³ For you created my inmost being;
    you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
¹⁴ I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
    your works are wonderful,
    I know that full well.

 May you know the love and security that comes from being a child of a great King.