A Woman’s Body

My body, partly tan, covered in water, my toes exposed on the other end of the tub.
Tan lines, stretch marks, a few scars. My body, 40 years old, all the places it has been, all the things it has done. My body, all the people it has loved, all those that have ridiculed, shamed or abused it.
I may have been the worst.

I spent many years taking everything negative said about me and amplifying it in the confines of my mind. Though those people and incidences are long ago and far away, the memories are always on replay in some form or another. They became my Identity, how I saw myself in the world.

I was all things negative with a megaphone inside.

It’s not easy to change your Identity; neuroscience teaches us that. I had unconsciously kept myself in situations that would reinforce this negative view of myself, easier than finding people that challenged it. It was hard to be around people who said nice things about me, as I’d had to fight with my view of myself. It made me uncomfortable, so I stuck around with people that would ever so slightly put me down. To make themselves feel better. That’s my place; it was comfortable there. I did not have to change my internal dialogue.

Sitting in my bathtub, water warm incents and oil, fun little rituals, being a woman, soft thighs, and a lightly round belly. Precisely as it should be, no thoughts of shame or anger, judgments or comparing. Just looking at it, some bellies make babies; that’s cool.
Feeling how thick my legs are, leaning into my feminine. Women are supposed to be a little soft and round, my breast thicker than usual, finally eating to fill my body, to flesh myself out.
I feel more solid as a woman, “sexy little belly” I hear it for what it is now, a man that appreciates a woman’s body how it’s supposed to be.

It has taken a long time to face the internalized hate, disgust, and shame dialogue. How much I devalued my body—generations of a woman’s value coming from her looks, shape, and size.
I was never meant to be frail, dainty, delicate. I was built to hold muscle, be strong, and push it to its limits. Though I never did, I just spent a life starving it to fit a picture someone told me I should be.
If I looked like someone else, I would have value, Though when I got close, I still never felt it, my mind still only holding the negative self-hate dialogue.

I had to cure the inside, find beauty in all women, and myself, find value in what my body can do for me, and push it. Separate my view of myself from those around me, listen to good friends who see the beauty in people and celebrate it, not diminish it.
And never forget to let my body be happy. I don’t let my mind walk down the comparison game. I am uniquely me, and that is pretty special. My beauty comes from owning this, loving it, and valuing all parts of me.
My tan belly glistened in the bath, feeling sexy because it’s a woman’s body; it does woman things; how amazing is that?