"Your Mum, She's Fat"

I was really confused when my husband sent me an article with this title. I thought - wow, he is being mean to my skinny mom...or wow...is he trying to tell ME something?!

I was so wrong. This article made me cry. I think every mom needs to read this...every WOMAN needs to read this. 

See, my husband loves me and supports me in every way imaginable. Yet, he gets SO upset at me when I'm super hard on myself for not looking how I want to look, or not losing all of this pregnancy weight yet, or not being what I 'think' I should be. He gets frustrated when I constantly compare myself to my thinner more beautiful friends that lost their pregnancy weight within weeks of delivering. 

Ultimately, he gets sad that I don't love myself as much as he loves me - and I don't see myself the way that he sees me, and the way that Caden sees me. 

He tells me over and over again how beautiful he thinks I am - but somehow, I don't believe him. This article though...it really spoke to me...and he knew it would. I love him even more for reading it and sending it to me.

I posted the article below - I really hope you read it, I promise you, it won't be a waste of your time. Here are the parts that spoke to me the most...

 "...I have spent my whole life feeling fat. When did fat become a feeling anyway? And because I believed I was fat, I knew I was no good."

"Let us honour and respect our bodies for what they do instead of despising them for how they appear. Focus on living healthy and active lives, let our weight fall where it may, and consign our body hatred in the past where it belongs. When I looked at that photo of you in the white bathing suit all those years ago, my innocent young eyes saw the truth. I saw unconditional love, beauty and wisdom. I saw my Mum."

I have already committed to eating clean and MAKING time to get to the gym, but I was still very much stuck in the mindset of hating my body and ultimately hating myself for looking the way I do. I would look in the mirror and say out loud, "Ugh...I'm disgusting" - (Andrew swore that if I said that one more time he was going to make me repeat, "I am beautiful" 5 times every day). It was poisonous to myself and I was spreading it to my family. I don't want to be this way anymore. I want to love and accept my body. I want to be proud of what it has accomplished and what it can do. Hello...3.5 months ago I had a Pitocin induced labor and had a successful DRUG FREE natural VBAC (vaginal birth after cesarean) HELLO...that's pretty badass. I literally thought I was going to die - but I NEVER gave up. Let's focus on that! My body can deadlift 215 pounds and endure crazy workouts and burpees and lifting and has run 3 half marathons. I have carried two beautiful babies - and heck, I can still pick up and carry my 5 year old when he needs it. 

First time overhead squatting - 115 pounds...pretty awesome!

So instead of focusing on the imperfections - I am committing to trying to see myself as my boys do - and according to them - I'm the most beautiful woman in the world. 

I know it's going to be hard, and I will look in the mirror occasionally and be upset about what I see, but I am not going to let this define me. 

I am healthy, I am strong, I am loved, and I am beautiful. (Andrew is going to be SO proud of me for saying that!)

I want to share this with my friends and family because I can only hope that this article speaks to you, as it has spoken to me. I know as women we are SO hard on ourselves; and it needs to stop. 

Seriously - please read this, it was beautifully written. I only wish I could write something so wonderful. 

When Your Mother Says She's Fat  by Kasey Edwards

"Dear Mum,

I was seven when I discovered that you were fat, ugly and horrible. Up until that point I had believed that you were beautiful - in every sense of the word. I remember flicking through old photo albums and staring at pictures of you standing on the deck of a boat. Your white strapless bathing suit looked so glamorous, just like a movie star. Whenever I had the chance I'd pull out that wondrous white bathing suit hidden in your bottom drawer and imagine a time when I'd be big enough to wear it; when I'd be like you.

But all of that changed when, one night, we were dressed up for a party and you said to me, ''Look at you, so thin, beautiful and lovely. And look at me, fat, ugly and horrible.''

At first I didn't understand what you meant.

''You're not fat,'' I said earnestly and innocently, and you replied, ''Yes I am, darling. I've always been fat; even as a child.''

In the days that followed I had some painful revelations that have shaped my whole life. I learned that:

1. You must be fat because mothers don't lie.
2. Fat is ugly and horrible.
3. When I grow up I'll look like you and therefore I will be fat, ugly and horrible too.

Years later, I looked back on this conversation and the hundreds that followed and cursed you for feeling so unattractive, insecure and unworthy. Because, as my first and most influential role model, you taught me to believe the same thing about myself.

With every grimace at your reflection in the mirror, every new wonder diet that was going to change your life, and every guilty spoon of ''Oh-I-really-shouldn't'', I learned that women must be thin to be valid and worthy. Girls must go without because their greatest contribution to the world is their physical beauty.

Just like you, I have spent my whole life feeling fat. When did fat become a feeling anyway? And because I believed I was fat, I knew I was no good.

But now that I am older, and a mother myself, I know that blaming you for my body hatred is unhelpful and unfair. I now understand that you too are a product of a long and rich lineage of women who were taught to loathe themselves.

Look at the example Nanna set for you. Despite being what could only be described as famine-victim chic, she dieted every day of her life until the day she died at 79 years of age. She used to put on make-up to walk to the letterbox for fear that somebody might see her unpainted face. 

I remember her ''compassionate'' response when you announced that Dad had left you for another woman. Her first comment was, ''I don't understand why he'd leave you. You look after yourself, you wear lipstick. You're overweight - but not that much.''

Before Dad left, he provided no balm for your body-image torment either.

''Jesus, Jan,'' I overheard him say to you. ''It's not that hard. Energy in versus energy out. If you want to lose weight you just have to eat less.''

That night at dinner I watched you implement Dad's ''Energy In, Energy Out: Jesus, Jan, Just Eat Less'' weight-loss cure. You served up chow mein for dinner. (Remember how in 1980s Australian suburbia, a combination of mince, cabbage, and soy sauce was considered the height of exotic gourmet?) Everyone else's food was on a dinner plate except yours. You served your chow mein on a tiny bread-and-butter plate.

As you sat in front of that pathetic scoop of mince, silent tears streamed down your face. I said nothing. Not even when your shoulders started heaving from your distress. We all ate our dinner in silence. Nobody comforted you. Nobody told you to stop being ridiculous and get a proper plate. Nobody told you that you were already loved and already good enough. Your achievements and your worth - as a teacher of children with special needs and a devoted mother of three of your own - paled into insignificance when compared with the centimetres you couldn't lose from your waist.

It broke my heart to witness your despair and I'm sorry that I didn't rush to your defence. I'd already learned that it was your fault that you were fat. I'd even heard Dad describe losing weight as a ''simple'' process - yet one that you still couldn't come to grips with. The lesson: you didn't deserve any food and you certainly didn't deserve any sympathy.

But I was wrong, Mum. Now I understand what it's like to grow up in a society that tells women that their beauty matters most, and at the same time defines a standard of beauty that is perpetually out of our reach. I also know the pain of internalising these messages. We have become our own jailors and we inflict our own punishments for failing to measure up. No one is crueller to us than we are to ourselves.

But this madness has to stop, Mum. It stops with you, it stops with me and it stops now. We deserve better - better than to have our days brought to ruin by bad body thoughts, wishing we were otherwise.

And it's not just about you and me any more. It's also about Violet. Your granddaughter is only 3 and I do not want body hatred to take root inside her and strangle her happiness, her confidence and her potential. I don't want Violet to believe that her beauty is her most important asset; that it will define her worth in the world. When Violet looks to us to learn how to be a woman, we need to be the best role models we can. We need to show her with our words and our actions that women are good enough just the way they are. And for her to believe us, we need to believe it ourselves.

The older we get, the more loved ones we lose to accidents and illness. Their passing is always tragic and far too soon. I sometimes think about what these friends - and the people who love them - wouldn't give for more time in a body that was healthy. A body that would allow them to live just a little longer. The size of that body's thighs or the lines on its face wouldn't matter. It would be alive and therefore it would be perfect.

Your body is perfect too. It allows you to disarm a room with your smile and infect everyone with your laugh. It gives you arms to wrap around Violet and squeeze her until she giggles. Every moment we spend worrying about our physical ''flaws'' is a moment wasted, a precious slice of life that we will never get back.

Let us honour and respect our bodies for what they do instead of despising them for how they appear. Focus on living healthy and active lives, let our weight fall where it may, and consign our body hatred in the past where it belongs. When I looked at that photo of you in the white bathing suit all those years ago, my innocent young eyes saw the truth. I saw unconditional love, beauty and wisdom. I saw my Mum.

Love, Kasey xx

This is an excerpt from Dear Mum, a collection of letters from Australian sporting stars, musicians, models, cooks and authors revealing what they would like to say to their mothers before it's too late, or would have said if only they'd had the chance.

All royalties go to the National Breast Cancer Foundation. Published by Random House and available now.

- Daily Life"

So, here's to committing to a life of loving, honoring, and respecting our bodies. Eat clean, stay active, push yourself, love yourself. I'm going to try - who's with me? 

and That's 'Watts' She Said...