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200 Ways to Love the Body You HaveWe will excerpt a passage from Marcia Hutchinson's wonderful new book regularly!
Buy the book from the Gurze catalog What does your body have to say to you? Reader responses (recent ones last): "Why are you hurting me? What have I done to deserve this treatment? Please take care of me, I depend on you. I want to be able to stay healthy and strong for you, why are you trying to stop me? I have the potential to be beautiful. Why won't you let me? I am sad and angry at the same time. I hate what I have become. Please get me in shape." "My stomach feels very sad. it is hurting inside. It is crying all the time because I am so cruel to it. It needs me to be gentle to it. It needs me to feed it gentle healthy foods for it to digest and send to my body. Instead I mistreat it by sending down harsh fatty foods that are hard to digest and then making it send the food back up the wrong way. It gets so confused and doesn't know when to digest things or when those things will just go back out the way that they came so it
rebels. It rebels by quitting. It gets tired of being teased and when I give it food to digest it doesn't know what to do with it. It creates gas and takes so long to digest and makes the bowel so hard to move through my intestines. My poor
stomach is sick of being torn apart by acids and is just about ready to quit on me if I don't start treating it right." "My stomach says to me: "It needs me to think positive about it. To not worry about what other people think. To not starve myself thinking I am fat." "this is your stomach. i am your most valuable ally. i tell you when there's danger. i tell you when there's pain. i tell you when you need nourishment. please stop ignoring me, hating me, stuffing me into silence. please stop fearing what i hide, the parts of you that you don't want to see." "I can't be silenced by your fear of sex, of flesh, of life. I want to carry you on the beach, not get stuck in the same position in front of the mirror under flourescent lights. I want to be touched with the right set of hands. I want you to let me be soft on top for those hands to feel, and strong underneath for you to respond to the touch." "I feel SO MUCH better since you've stopped starving me! In the past, I tried so hard to hold on to the few nutrients you would allow me, and I've been successful in storing some fat away for any future "famines", and I've kept you alive in spite of yourself! My main job is to keep you alive and keep us going, and I've done it well. Since you've begun to take better care of me, we've become healthier, more resistant to colds and flu, and haven't been sick in over a year! Our muscles and bones are strong, and we don't have to worry about osteoporosis! When we work together as a team and you respect the genetic inheritance that we share, we both live better, healthier, and happier! Thanks!" "I am the body of a child whom you have been neglecting for several years. Why don't you love me and care for me? I must have food to grow and play, and to learn about the life that I have been missing! I need healthy, gently exercise that won't strain my muscles and joints, and I can't bear it when you make me vomit. It hurts me so badly and keeps me from receiving the nutrition I need to grow." "My stomach is neglected and needs small meals. It needs to be paid attention to and needs lots of touching stroking and care." "We do not hurt you--we have done so much--fed your daughter--we do not ask anything of you---we know you hate our size and shape, we are part of you and are not going away. We are PART of YOU." "You know, it really kills me that you feed me all kind of crap, and that i don't know from one minute to the next whether you're going to be starving or bingeing and throwing up. But i thought i'd been pretty good about the whole ordeal, for a stomach and all. i appreciated it when you started to behave almost normally for a change, well, normally by comparison anyway. But i have to have some TIME here. you can't just trash me for years and years and then expect me to be what you want all the time the minute you begin to behave yourself. i don't trust you yet. and even when i DO start to trust you i;m not saying i'm going to shrink all of a sudden. i may not bother you as much and all, but you're going to have to accept me the way i am. you think that flesh on other women is beautiful. what did I do that i have to be different from that? why can't you love me, too?" "Need attention "I am sad you don't love me more. Sometimes I'm proud, but other times I carry a lot of grief. Images are often
telling me how to be- that I'm not good enough, that I don't have enough to offer, and that I don't have
enough inside. It sometimes feels like I'm expected to feed everyone and have no needs for appreciation.
I'm glad that I've gotten some sexual healing recently. It makes me feel wanted- like someone else can help Stop hiding me. No one's perfect. Okay so I've got a few bumps, lumps and bulges. But legs are legs. And they are meant to be seen. Okay. Keep exercising. I think I'm getting better. Stronger and smaller. Maybe I can still tone all the way. Thanks. Stop complaining and leave me alone. I'm here to stay and you have two beautiful children to show for it.
Sorry about number three. That was tough. I'm tired of hearing that you're going to cut me off. I know
it's gross. Get over it. I didn't know this would happen. Exercise does not seem to help. It appears to be
too late, but I'm a part of you now. You should have exercised after the babies, I guess. Don't suck
anything out of me, I might not heal properly. So far nothing else has worked. Just try to get used to me. I immediately thought of the flab around my stomach area. The flab, however, immediately thought of the important parts of it was protecting, namely, the reproductive organs of my body and drew to my attention the validity of accepting the beautiful function of its overabundance. I am the most breathtaking thing in the world. I am unique and beautiful. But when you look at me you do not see what I am. When you look at me you say your hair's too frizzy, your skin imperfect and blochy, your ear and nose too large, your eyes yucky brown, your lips too thin, your breasts too small, your arm too flabby, your stomach too fat, your butt huge and dimpley, your thighs enormous, your calfs not defined, and your feet too big. Why did those boys you passed look at you? Did they turn their heads because you were too ugly to believe, or maybe, just maybe they looked at you because they see the true you. Not the mirage you see when you study yourself. Maybe they see a beautiful girl I am. Maybe they see a person I want to see but can not because I am clouded with magazines and "the way I should look." My mind and my body are separate. My mind tells me that I am ugly, but my body is screaming that it's beautiful. My stomach says that it cannot help the fact that it sticks out "too much". It verifies that I have strong ab muscles, but the construction of this part of my body is in such a way that even if I am extremely thin, it will still protrude. It says that I can get angry and blame myself and my eating habits, but it will do no good. Relax. Have some rest and sleep. So I, your body, can take care of you. i am everything that you need. without me you can not physically exist. what i am others crave to have, but all i hear from you are complaints. why can't i occasionally hear a positive word. i do so much for you and all i hear is bitching. be happy you can walk, talk, sing, dance, smile. i am not as fat as you think. i am not as frumpy. i am not as ugly. love me, and you will love yourself. Why can't you be normal like you used to be and like your friends are? You make me so sad and so empty. I will always be here for you but yet you neglect me. Please think about what you are doing to me. My body is worn out from useless diet fads. It just wants me to eat whatever I think is okay, not what others think or say. It's tired of being neglected by food. when you look at me naked you cry. all you see is the bad: the dimples, sploches, bumps. but i am more than that. i am the only thing that will always be there for you. i am the only thing that will follow you throughout life. i make you unique and beautiful. somewhere inside you know this. somewhere inside this is hiding. i wish you wouldn't cry next time you look at me. I WANT TO BE LOVED. I WANT WANT WANT TO BE BEAUTIFUL. Everytime you pass by the mirror I see the look of disgust on your face. Everytime you criticize me I hear it. Why do you do this when you are beautiful? How long will it take you to see the truth? My body is saying to me-it's sick of all the abuse that it has endured over the past four years. At 17, I think my body is exhausted. It is saying please let me have some nutrients, some relaxation, but most of all, please love me for who I am. I need you to love me and treat me properly. I
really feel upset about the way you treat me. I need to be loved, valued, cherished and put first. You put everybody before me. |
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