How many of us are on the opposite side of the norm: we've lived our lives completely happy with our bodies - reveling in them even - and then, suddenly, something happens and our physical appearance is changed. We lose (or so it feels) who we are, who we've been, and no one, even our spouse, looks at us the same way again.
Can we regain lost ground? Can we return, though time runs away from us at alarming speed, to what we knew, to how we were?
How many of us have scars that criss-cross our bodies, scars we're at first self-conscious of, and only later, when we've had time to breathe through the crisis, do we realize these are our Life Lines. Without them we'd not be here. And we no longer feel compelled to hide them, to look for clothes that conceal them, to make excuses. We are survivors, and we are proud.
Yet a body out of commission for a long time...no exercise....the brunt of illness...of battle...what was once taut and toned and proud is now mushy and not nearly as limber....where we used to pour over the Victoria Secret catalog dreaming of what we'd buy and wear proudly (take off proudly!) we now worry about the room being dark enough (totally?) and about whether or not the ridges and bumps of life-saving procedures will be revered for the sacred spots they are, or avoided as the slightly gross things one has already expressed to us they are.
We can go from being overweight to being slimmer, and move into having pride in our selves and our bodies. What about those of us who move the other way? Who have always had pride, felt sexy, desired, and beautiful, and now don't?
How do you do get back to that? Talk to me, please. I know I'm blessed beyond reason - yet I cannot accept that this part - the senuous, sexy, wanton, womanly part of my life is over (as I knew it). How have you adjusted and regained that sense of self?
Is it really a matter of just jumping back in? Whatever it's a matter of - it's time.
