My body is a battle ground.

I am insecure. Negative. Critical. Downright disrespectful and rude to my Creator.  

Why, you ask?

Because daily, if not multiple times a day, I look in the mirror and think, "I hate my body! Are my stretch marks ever going to go away?  Am I ever going to feel good about myself?  Are those dang numbers on the scale EVER going to go down?  What a lovely six-inch scar that is!”

The very way God created me when He knit me together in my mother's womb, I criticize. I tell Him that I think, at least when it comes to me, He has failed as a creator.  

I am ashamed to admit that I have thought these thoughts as many times as there are hairs on my head, and I know that every time the light is turned off and the mirror is dark, Satan smirks. He has won the battle. He has won a victory over me. Again.

Don't get me wrong: it's not that I have been in denial or that this is a new issue for me. I have been fighting this battle since I was fifteen years old, and a boy told me I was looking "chunky" in my bathing suit. It’s amazing what damage such destructive words can do. Twelve years later, I can still hear those words as if they have just been spoken.

“Chunky.”

“Fat.”

And yet, I can also hear the whispers of my Heavenly Father, my earthly father, my husband, my mom, my sisters, my friends.

“Beautiful.”  

“Lovely.”  

“Pretty.”

Why do I listen to the one ugly voice over the ten that actually speak the TRUTH to me?

After those destructive words were spoken to me as a teenager, I decided that, of all things, I would prove him wrong. That little fifteen-year-old boy was a friend, and I am sure he was really and truly joking. In the moment, I laughed it off. It was my only defense, but it wasn’t a very good one. The damage was already done.

So I stopped eating. At least, I started eating as little as possible. I was playing basketball and cheering my junior year of high school. When I wasn't at practice for either of those teams, I was working out at home, skiing, or playing volleyball. I began to shrink. My waistline was smaller, yes, but so was my heart. This is my problem. My disease. The battle I have fought for the last twelve years.  

In her book, Loving the Little Years, Rachel Jankovic writes, "Your bodies are tools, not treasures. You should not spend your days trying to preserve your body in its eighteen-year-old form. Let it be used.  By the time you die, you want to have a very dinged and dinted body. Motherhood uses your body in a way that God designed it to be used. Those are the right kind of damages. Motherhood is what your stomach was made for—and any wear and tear that it shows is simply the sign of a well-used tool. We are not to treat our bodies like museum pieces. They were not given to us to preserve; they were given to us to use. So use it cheerfully and maintain it cheerfully. Your body is a tool. Use it."  

::sigh::

Okay.

Those stretch marks are like permanent kisses my girl left for me.  

That six-inch scar is my daily reminder to be thankful for the doctor who poured over books and tests for years in medical school to be ready for that one day—March 11, 2011, at 12:33 a.m.—the day the cord was wrapped around my girl’s neck and her heartbeat couldn't be detected.  Her life: a miracle. Her cry: the most beautiful sound to my terrified ears. 

I can feel good about myself because I am a beautiful work created by the Almighty God who doesn't make mistakes. He calls me beautiful. Complete. His.

So here is my goal: I want to eliminate the words, "I hate [blank]," from my vocabulary.

Will you hold me accountable? Will you help me stop believing Satan's lies? Will you discipline me like a mother disciplines her children when they speak destructive words to another child?  

I have a powerful motivation: my Gracie. Only sixteen months old now, but before I can blink it will be sixteen years. This battle is NOT a legacy; it’s a curse, and I do not want to pass it on to her.  

Besides, I love every ounce of her "chunk," and you know what? She loves mine, too.