Scales and lbs.

 "Wow, you're nowhere near as skinny as I thought!" The words came booming from behind me, flooding my ears and piercing my chest. I was spending the night at a friend's house for the first time and we were just about to get ready for bed. 

"What did you say?" I asked as I turned around, pajama pants in hand and riddled with confusion. She continued with "You looked super skinny in your outfit earlier but now I see that you're not much smaller than me." 

...Skinny. I just want to be skinny. I want to be able to fit into the smallest pair of jeans and wear the latest crop top. I want to walk down the street and turn heads and even though I don't like being catcalled I want to have the option to turn someone down instead of never being spoken to at all....

Scales and lbs, those two things used to be all that filled my mind. I would try so hard to just be happy, to sit with myself and everything that included and smile but I couldn't seem to muster up the strength. My weight, whether it was over or under, consumed me and this moment did nothing to rectify that truth. 

...Beautiful. Does this size small make me beautiful? Does it add to my worth and the person I desire to be? Will it make less people walk by and more stop and notice me? Will it make me smile more and cry less? Will it make the sting of societal expectations of weight and beauty less painful? I hope so...

I laughed when she said that and threw her a half hearted "whatever," before running to the bathroom. I sat on the floor leaning up against the tub clutching my pajama pants. Tears ran down my face as I looked at my thighs and felt my stomach, wishing that I could be as skinny as she thought I was. 

...One less bite this time, smaller portions next time. Less sweets, less carbs, less fatty foods. Less laughter, less smiles, less joy in the face of childhood. Anything, to get that one thing. Finger down the throat, lunch in the toilet bowl...anything to get that one thing. Dinner in the trash, empty plate on the table pretending to be full...anything to get that one thing....

I'm not sure exactly where the switch happened. It happened so seamlessly that it's almost like I woke up and was a new creature. All of a sudden the number on the scale, the size of the pants and the weight held in by skin, was no longer tied to my worth. Good enough wasn't something to earn but rather a truth to accept. 

...No matter how much I weigh, I am good enough. No matter what the size of my jeans are, I am good enough. Whether I eat a salad or two donuts, I am good enough. If I go to the gym, I am good enough. If I can't find time to workout, I am good enough. If I lose weight I'm good enough. If I gain a pound, or two, or three, I am good enough. I am good enough. I am good enough. I am good enough... 

"I will shed all of this skin down to the very bone beneath it if that's what it will take for you to come to the realization that appearance is not what makes a human beautiful." 

"At least I got a man."

When I was a teenager I remember being at church and there was a girl there teasing me. I can't even remember exactly what she was making fun of me for but I remember at the end she said "You might be smarter than me but at least I got a man."

As soon as she said that everyone around us started laughing and saying things like "that's true," and other stupid comments. I walked away from her feeling like I had just been hardcore shamed, like my intelligence was something but nothing compared to the fact that this girl had a 'man.'

The other day I had a deja vu moment with one of my friends, a moment that took me back to being a shamed kid at church. This person is someone that I consider to be extremely intelligent, successful and on their way to even bigger success.We were texting about our lives and things that we're doing currently and at one point she said "Well you're still doing better than me because you have a man now."

When I read her message I was dumbfounded. I sat there just reading the message over and over again and I couldn't help but to laugh. Why is it that being in a relationship determines how well someone is doing?  I sat there thinking about her, someone that I look up to so much and felt so sad that she thinks that I'm in anyway doing better than she is simply because I'm dating someone and she's not.

For the last five months or so I've talked a lot about my relationship, it's really hard not to. Patrick is my first boyfriend and we spend a lot of time together. Patrick is an amazing human and friend and I just want to tell everyone about him. Being with him has added even more joy to my life than was there before, he's an answer to prayer.

Let me say this though if for some reason, God forbid, Patrick and I broke up my worth on this earth wouldn't change.

As an educator that works a lot with teenage girls, this is an issue that is very close to my heart. I see girls everyday, ones that are running from relationship to relationship trying to find worth and meaning in this world. They're reaching for dirty hands and unattainable hearts hoping to find belonging and acceptance through their relationship status and I know how it feels.

Even though I grew up with a present and loving father and amazing brothers, when I went to college and got a taste of the rat race of false love I was addicted to the attention. It's only by God's grace that I didn't end up sleeping with some no good man and really changing the trajectory of my life.

I'm saying all of this to say, that I am so proud to be a woman. I am proud to be made in the image of Christ and to be a portrait of his creativity and goodness and my identity and my worth is firmly rooted in that. I'm proud of the places I've been, the stories I've walked through and also the many lives that I've been able to impact through work.

If Patrick and I get married then I think part of my identity will change. Being married will require so much more commitment from us than just being in a relationship and with a name change, moving in together and the merging of families we'll become one. Even when that happens, the greatest and most enriching part of my identity will still be in who I am in Christ.

I've written about this before but society often tells us that as women we haven't fully made it until someone wants us, marries us and makes us their own. Today I want to tell you that you're wanted, you're cherished and you're loved. You're loved by someone that will never leave you, never fail you and never forsake you until the end of age. God is that someone. If you're single and someone throws it in your face than dear just let me remind you that you always have God and he's not an "at least" he's more than enough.

"If you are not attaching your identity to the unshakable love of your savior, you will ask the things in your life to be your savior and it will never happen." - Paul David Tripp