Love the Skin You're IN!

{Post 42/365: Original Post: I AM a QUEEN}
I admit I have a hard time with this sometimes.
I have never been a tiny girl and I have never had a "perfect" body and while I'm speaking honestly I will admit, I would almost kill to have the body I was in when I was 15!
Back then, I was FAT to all the girls around me because I am big boned and tall.
I earned the body I live in by inheriting my father's genes and I thank God for that every day because the alternative is my mother's genes being stronger and I'd be a short, round butterball!! At least I AM tall, and also I'm pretty well evenly proportioned so there is that! However, I digress...I have learned through the years, mainly from being just perfect for my age and height and also totally over weight and unhealthy...so basically the whole spectrum of weights and sizes that, I was GOOD when I was 15.
If I'd only liked and accepted myself back then maybe I'd not hate so much the body I'm in now! The thing is that life is a process and a journey and part of it is learning to love yourself the way you are.
I don't like my arms or my stomach.
My arms at one point were bigger around than those of my father.  What woman ever wants to admit that? OMG! I don't want to admit it really but nevertheless it IS a fact.
My stomach is hideous. It is just a big mess of stretch marks and flabby excessive skin.
I gave birth to four children. The third one I lost when I was 4 1/2 months pregnant but that was not before the skin had begun to stretch again so I must also count that pregnancy as a factor in the growth or rather non-shrinking of my stomach skin.
Each pregnancy made the stretch marks worse and I had no idea about whether or not it was possible to heal them at the time so I just suffered with the big ugly purple EVIL grooves in my skin. Gross! Now, they have faded almost to the same colour as the rest of my skin but, still I can see them when I stand naked in front of the mirror and I hate them.
They are an ugly horrible part of my body I wish were not there.
So here's the thing. Maybe, only having two parts I really hate out of all the other body parts I have isn't so bad. Maybe if I can manage to teach my brain to respect and honour the fact that the stomach stretched as a result of carrying four beautiful miracles. Never mind the fact that one of them was lost to me the fact is I gave birth to four children and three of them are beautiful, healthy, fascinating, wonderful people.
I earned those stretch marks for a beautiful reason and I should NOT be ashamed of them or insecure about them or even disgusted by them.
I should just recognize and accept that they are the result of a process I endured to carry inside me the most amazing miracles that life could have ever given me!
Thinking of it like this makes me feel better!
As for the arms...well I don't like them and I never will and the only reason they are the way they are is because I DID gain so much weight and all of that was the result of a long, painful, damaging process I went through.  Then my health went kaput and I needed new and different medicines and a whole trial and error process to get everything back on track through which I lost about half the weight I had gained. As a result, I have big, ugly, baggy arms because the skin stretched and now hangs.
However, I have been through enough in my life and I decided awhile ago if people have problems with the way I look they can turn their head and look at the wall instead.
I am alive.
I have survived.
I have endured.
I have hurt enough.
This body is really only the package I come in.  It is just the shell that houses my mind, heart, and soul.  These are the important parts of me.
So, while I admit I don't like the arms and the stomach I have learned to love and accept the rest of me.
The skin that I'm in is good enough for me!