Mothers

Its been all over the blogoshere for the last week or so, talk about the Shape of a Mother blog. Of course I have been and read it. Some of it almost brought me to tears. I have thought very hard about adding my thing, then I read this post and all of the comments on it over at Tertias blog.

That of course made me think about it even more. And this is what I came away with.

Mothers are not all stretch marked and mishapen, they dont all carry exterior physical scars to show they are mothers. In fact mothers are made in all different ways. The blog is very much about women who have become mothers via pregnancy, but that is not the only way to become a mother.

To illustrate this take myself, and one of my oldest friends. We have been friends for nearly thirty years, we shared much of our growing up, we are now both married and both mothers. The difference is, I am lucky enough to be very fertile, achieving pregnancy was easy for me. I make no apologies for this, it is just the way that it was. My friend is infertile. She attempted many assisted fertility options, she tried for years to fall pregnant and it just didnt happen. She and her husband adopted a daughter the year I gave birth to my third child.

Do I think I am more of a mother because I gave birth to a daughter, where as she did not? No way. We both have four year old girls living in our houses who call us mum. After four years the fact that her daughter is adopted isnt something I think about at all. The relationship she shares with her daughter is no different to that I share with mine.

After thinking all of this through for ages last night I have decided I am not going to add an entry to the Shape of a Mother blog. I think it is a wonderful blog, and I will continue to read it but my saggy tummy is not what makes me a mother. For me the pregnancy thing was only the means to the end, for my friend the paperwork was the means to the end. Being a mother is all about your relationship with your child everyday, all about the love that it takes to shape that child into the adult it will be one day.

I have shaped my children with my heart and with my hands. Each time I do something for them, my hands are the conduit of my love, they shape the future for my child until my child can take over and contine it for themselves. All mothers have this gift, it is theirs to bestow upon their child regardless of the journey that brought that child into their lives.

The shape of me as a mother is...


These hands 

Mothers

Its been all over the blogoshere for the last week or so, talk about the Shape of a Mother blog. Of course I have been and read it. Some of it almost brought me to tears. I have thought very hard about adding my thing, then I read this post and all of the comments on it over at Tertias blog.

That of course made me think about it even more. And this is what I came away with.

Mothers are not all stretch marked and mishapen, they dont all carry exterior physical scars to show they are mothers. In fact mothers are made in all different ways. The blog is very much about women who have become mothers via pregnancy, but that is not the only way to become a mother.

To illustrate this take myself, and one of my oldest friends. We have been friends for nearly thirty years, we shared much of our growing up, we are now both married and both mothers. The difference is, I am lucky enough to be very fertile, achieving pregnancy was easy for me. I make no apologies for this, it is just the way that it was. My friend is infertile. She attempted many assisted fertility options, she tried for years to fall pregnant and it just didnt happen. She and her husband adopted a daughter the year I gave birth to my third child.

Do I think I am more of a mother because I gave birth to a daughter, where as she did not? No way. We both have four year old girls living in our houses who call us mum. After four years the fact that her daughter is adopted isnt something I think about at all. The relationship she shares with her daughter is no different to that I share with mine.

After thinking all of this through for ages last night I have decided I am not going to add an entry to the Shape of a Mother blog. I think it is a wonderful blog, and I will continue to read it but my saggty tummy is not what makes me a mother. For me the shape of the mother is only the means to the end, being a mother is all about the child. All about the love that it takes to mold that child into the adult it will become one day.

I have shaped my children with my heart and with my hands. Each time I do something for them, my hands are the conduit of my love, they shape the future that will be my childs until my child can take over and contine it for themselves. All mothers have this gift, it is theirs to bestow upon their child regardless of the journey that brought that child into their lives.

This girls life...

is so boring lol.

I have spent the last week wondering what I would find to post about next. Nothing much has been going on in my life, just the same ol same ol.

The kids are back at school, dh is working long hours because its the end of financial year and he's and accountant, I am back at work two days a week... and thats about it.

I read so many blogs (note to self, update list of links here) and so many of you are having so much going on in your lives. I need to organise some excitment to keep up with all of the exploits of the internets around me.

On the health and fitness front things are still rumbling along. I am still exercising and eating OK, but I am still not losing any weight on the scales - bummer. All I can do is keep on working at it. Sooner or later it will all click together. I have been doing WW No count, but I am going to switch to points because obviously I am doing something wrong with the no count.

I have lots of half finished scrapbook pages sitting on my desk, and they are starting to really bug me, so I am off to a scrapathon tomorrow night, in the hope of getting some of them done.

Babysitting today, so I better go and check on the little one. Hopefully I can think of something more exciting to post tomorrow.

Musings

Had one of those weekends that is just dead set lazy. It rained all weekend! Thats something we haven't experienced for such a long time. I had a nostaligic kind of mood hanging over me all weekend because of the rain. When I was a kid I remember weekends of rain, I lived in Sydney then, so the rain wasn't accompanied by icy frost cold then like it is here in Canberra, and we used to play in the rain. You know, run around in the puddles, splash each other, get really wet, really dirty but have a great time.

My kids like to do that too. The thing is by the time they come in their little fingers are only a degree away from frostbite (usually their toes too, because they wont keep shoes on), their noses are red, and dripping, and of course now it is my job to clean up the mess they make when they come back in. So unsurprisingly I am no longer a big fan of the kids playing in the rain lol. Ah its only when you are an adult and have the resonsiblity of children yourself that you appreciate what you put your mother though.

Brrr

So cold today, outside top temp supposed to be 10 degrees celcius. I dont know if it actually made it. I do know that I just cant warm up, even my toes are cold inside my ugh boots. Thats cold.

BTW the scales suck badly - I think they must be broken as they have not budged a micromillimetre in the last ten days (yes I have been weighing everyday bad bad bad). I am continuing on the healthy eating plan, and the exercise, it must be working somewhere somehow - frustrating. At the same time my friend has lost 2.6kg, which makes it harder to swallow my stationary status.

Hoping tomorrow is warmer and less weighty.

in the groove

I finally feel like I am getting back in the healthy groove. I am back to exercising regularly, and eating sensibly. Feels good too.

I was so proud of myself on Saturday night. We had friends coming over for tea, I cooked roast lamb, potatoes, pumpkin, carrots, peas and gravy for mains, then chocolate brownies and ice cream for dessert. I told myself I wasn't going to have dessert in the morning, just serve everyone elses and finish my glass of wine while they ate.

Of course I have said this dozens of times before, all set up with good intentions etc, but usually I cave in and eat it, then end up gorging on it because I am so pissed with myself for giving in.

Finally succes!!! I didn't eat dessert, I only had one serving of tea even though there was heaps left over, I only had a couple of glasses of wine, and I didn't eat any nibblies.

In the past I would have felt really ripped off, like I had missed out big time on all the good stuff, amazingly this time I felt really good.

And even better I didn't wake at 2.30am with roaring heartburn, and there was no sign of a hang over on Sunday morning. That Rocks!!

The best part about it was, I didn't even feel like I missed out. How good is that. I have never felt like that before.

Since then I have had a good week, I have eaten sensibly and exercised. I feel almost like a normal fit and healthy person again this week, for the first time in sooooo long.

I cancelled my gym membership this week too. My friend and I have set up a home gym routine using hand weights, swiss ball and resistance bands (well we will use resistance bands next time when she remembers to bring them). Twice a week we are meeting on my family room floor to work out together. I will do another workout on the weekend with DH to make it to three a week. Yesterday was great. Some of the exercises would look out of place in the gym - like bench pressing the two year old because she wanted to play too lol, but the result was the same, I felt like I had a good workout by the end of it. And now that $55 a month I have been paying for gym that I dont use anymore can go into my account for clothing for summer in a smaller size. Yay Me.

This afternoon I was really getting the munchies, and I did reach into the cupboard for some choc bits, you know the ones you use in choc chip cookies, but after eating one, I came to my senses and got myself a bowl of cereal instead. It does mean that I have gone over points for the day, but at least the cereal filled me up, whereas the choc bits wouldn't have, and I would have ended up standing in the pantry again eating indiscriminately (sp?)

Hoping for a good result at my next weigh in - cos I deserve it :-)

3 days in a row

for the first time in ages I have exercised three days in a row yipee

Saturday I walked for thirty minutes.
Sunday I walked for an hour and a half and lots of that was straight uphill
Monday I walked for thirty minutes

Yay me.

Tuesday I wont get out for a walk today as I have been at work all day, then picking the kids up from the other side of the city, so I will aim to do some pilates or light weights tonight just to keep up some momentum.

The walk on Sunday was hard, it made me realise how unfit I am, half way up the hill I was ready to puke, and I looked up to see the kids RUNNING the last part to the top. Man what a bummer, that meant I had to keep going, and it really was too steep for me to turn around and walk back down lol.

I have found with my gammy knee I can now walk up hills, but I cant walk down very well. I joked to my DH that I could go out walking, up all of the hills, and call him on my mobile to come pick me up once I have to come back down again :-)

Guess that means I am on my way to heaven cos I cant get down to hell LOL

Got another planned walk in the morning to take Joan to preschool, then I might continue on from there and make a longer outing of it. The two older kids and the puppy will be with me, and they can walk pretty fast and pretty far now.

How pathetic, I am actually excited at the thought of exercising everyday this week - I need to get a life ;-)))

Owning It

Saturday, 1 July 2006

My last weigh in was uneventful, no loss, no gain. I can honestly say though that is exactly what I expected. After my previous post I had a week or so mired in procrastination, self disgust, despair, introspection, apathy, the whole spectrum of emotions. But the good thing was I allowed it to happen, I didnt try to talk myself in to positivity, I just let myself feel it all. It was hard, but good, I know now that just because I don't stick to plan for a week it is not the end of the world, I also know that if I lie to myself about my actions I will be forever disappointed with my results.

I have to own my actions, and my emotions, not let them own me.

I set myself some goals for the week, I stated them here, I only achieved one of them.

I didn't walk for half an hour everyday
I didn't steer clear of BLT

I didn't lie to myself

I accept my responsibility in this weeks result. I didn't eat like someone trying to lose weight, I didn't exercise like someone trying to lose weight, there fore I didn't lose weight.

I did however feel more positive in my whole journey.

My goal for the month of June was to lose 2kg. My result for June was 700g. That puts me 1.3kg to make up for. It unrealistic to think I will do all of this in July, but over July and August it is possible, which will put me back on track for achieving my goals in the time frame I am aiming for.

For so long I have been "losing weight", but I don't think I have really put a time frame on it. It was just going to happen when it happened. Well you can see how well that has been working for me. So I sat down with my trusty Excel Spreadsheet and worked out a time frame for my goals. I am looking at this being a year long project, it may come faster than that, and if it does that is great, but if it doesn't I am OK with that too.

My goal is to lose 20kg (44 lbs), and I am aiming at doing this by 1st June 2007. To do this I must lose up to 500g (1.1 lbs) per week. When I say up to I am allowing for the fact that some weeks I will lose less than this, some I may lose more, and some weeks like Christmas, I may even maintain or gain. 20kg in 12 months is doable. It is now up to me to do it.

This week I will not indulge in BLTs
This week I will walk for half an hour everyday
This week I will continue to be honest with myself