My Baby Weight Loss Story & Journey to Self Love & Acceptance

I really want my blog to be an honest place; somewhere that people can come to for inspiration to live a clean, healthy, holistic life. I was talking to my husband about this recently and he convinced me that I should be honest about my story and my struggles with my weight and self acceptance. So, as nerve racking and stomach churning as this is to write, I hope that some of you may be able to relate to my story.

Here goes...

I've never really been skinny or overweight. I've always considered myself to be a pretty 'average', however, since I was about 15 I remember having a strong sense that when it came to weight and appearance in life, 'average' wasn't good enough (I can actually pin point the exact moment at 15 that I first ever felt like I was too big, but that's another blog post...). Like so many other young women, since that age I have constantly beaten myself up for having too much pudge, not enough tone, too big of a stomach, too flat of a bum, chubby arms, the list goes on... I actually remember the night I started dating my husband we were posing for a photo and I asked for it to be retaken because I didn't like the little fat roles between my arm and chest (you know the crease that happens under your arm when you hold your arm snug next to your body) that are inevitable on pretty much everyone. I still have that photo and it looks ridiculous because it is just of our heads! What!?

This self critical talk only got worse when I had my babies and struggled with my post baby weight. After both of my babies were born I had about 10kg to lose to get back to my pre-baby weight. After I had Mason, I did it with short bursts of super restrictive eating which I could only ever sustain for a week or two. I would drop a chunk of weight and then go back to my normal eating, maintain that for a few weeks before getting another burst of motivation. It wasn't a healthy way of doing it.

Shortly after Chloe was born I came across a program called Jamie Eason Live Fit which was a fairly intense 12 week challenge on www.bodybuilding.com. I started the program on the 14th of January this year and for the first time in my life I took it really seriously and stuck to it for the duration of the 12 weeks. It involved a very strict regimented eating plan of 6 meals a day with balanced carbs, protein and fats, and it tapered carbs off towards the end of the day. There were also 5-6 sessions of weights and cardio per week. I was spending about 1.5 hours in the gym 5-6 times a week. This was when I started my 'Clean Fit Mum' instagram account, was taking progress pics every 2 weeks and started to get really serious about 'being healthy'. It didn't take long for me to start seeing serious results too. I had a lot of people noticing my weight loss and I was fitting my clothes better and seeing results in my progress pics, but the closer I got to my goals, the more I altered them so they were out of reach. Here are my week 8 progress pics. You can see that I was seeing results, but I still wasn't happy with how I looked.

When I reached my original goal, I said it didn't feel the way I thought it would so I set another goal of being even lighter. I had this idea in my head for so many years that if I could just get to a certain weight on the scales then I would be happy and all of my insecurities would disappear. I was so surprised and disappointed to find that not only did they not disappear, but I would probably say they became worse. I was so focused on my weight and body shape that even though I was the smallest I had been in my adult life, I still didn't feel that good about myself. It had also started to feel all consuming. I would stress about going to family functions or being in situations where I couldn't stick to my diet plan. I would take my chicken breast, sweet potato and broccoli to birthday parties and baby showers and beat myself up like crazy for days if I did have a cheat.

I got into a bad pattern of emotional eating to fill the void that I thought would be filled when I got to my goal weight. So surprise surprise, I put most of the weight back on! And in only a month! At this point I was feeling truly miserable. I was so confused about what would make me happy. What I had thought would make me happy, didn't. So what now?

At times I convinced myself that food made me happy, so I should just accept that in the end it wasn't worth doing all the work to be skinny and being able to indulge regularly in Hot Chocolates and Tim Tams felt better. I lived in that place for a while but inevitably felt worse and worse. It was at this point that I stumbled upon a few health & wellness blogs in search of motivation to get back on the bandwagon and to my surprise instead I had a revelation.

My problem was not my weight and never was my weight. My problem was that I didn't love and accept myself and if I didn't love and accept myself the way I was at any given moment then I never would. It didn't matter how much weight I lost or how flat my stomach was, if I kept telling myself I wasn't good enough, then I would always believe I wasn't good enough. This was when my whole attitude shifted and I felt like things started to change.

I started to consciously look at myself and my body and say why wouldn't I love myself? My body has given birth to two healthy babies (Thanks for that body! You are pretty bloody awesome!) It's not perfect, but who's is?

At first the thought of looking at myself and thinking 'I love myself' felt uncomfortable, wrong, conceited and stupid, but I kept doing it anyway and eventually I started to believe it. As I started to believe it I started to become concious of treating myself like I would treat someone I love. I was kind, forgiving, accepting and nurturing. I didn't feel the urge to binge on junk food. I wanted to fuel my body with the best food available. If I slipped up, I was conscious about forgiving myself quickly and moving on. At first it didn't come naturally. I wanted to tell myself I was weak and pathetic for not being able to resist temptation, so I imagined what I would say to my best friend if she said she had slipped up on her diet. It has since started to happen naturally and I rarely make a bad food choice because I want to treat my body as well as I possibly can. But, if I do have a moment of weakness, I can honestly say I hardly give it a second thought. I think to myself 'woops, shouldn't have done that because that isn't the best thing for my body, but oh well, it's done now. Moving on...'

To say that you love yourself is not being 'up yourself'. It has nothing to do with ego. It has to do with respect. Having respect for your own mind and body is something that can completely change your life for the better.

I am by no means at a point where I no longer struggle with self esteem, self confidence and self acceptance. A far cry in fact. But, I am so much closer than I was a few months ago or a few years ago, or ever. I still hear the little voice inside my head when I look at myself in the mirror that says 'you aren't good enough', but every day I am getting better at ignoring that voice and training myself to think 'I love and accept myself exactly as I am today'. I must say, it is bloody refreshing!

At the moment, my weight has reached a happy place of sorts somewhere in between the two photos above. I eat healthy every day. I move my body every day. And I think good thoughts every day. So if this is where my body wants to be when I am doing all of those things, then I am happy with that.

I hope this post has come across in a way that makes anyone who falls into the trap of thinking 'I'll be happy when...' or 'I'd be happy if...' think why not be happy now? Why not accept myself as I am? Love myself as I am? It is still okay to try to change yourself for the better, but do it from a place of love for yourself. Change your diet because you respect your body, not because you want to be skinny, or fit into a certain size, or look like someone else. Go to the gym or do a yoga class because it makes you feel good and it is good for your body, not because it will burn a certain amount of calories. If you alter your thinking, you might find like I did that that is what will change your feelings toward a certain situation, even if the situation itself doesn't change or hasn't changed yet.

Thankyou for taking the time to read my story. I am so grateful and I truly hope you got something out of it. If you liked it, please share it with your friends :)

Sophia xo

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