Whose body is this?

Becoming a mother meant giving up the mastery of my own body and becoming a temple for Creation. You'd think you get the control over your body back after giving birth. The child comes out and what's left is entirely you - yep, I would love it to be that simple.

My body has flexed and stretched in various ways - most of them not really flattering. I often feel of balance and still feel like my body is mainly a tool for someone else. It's a safe haven for Bigger Princes to climb on when she is tired or scared. It's a feeding platform for Little Princes. It is mainly needed and often used by - well just about everyone else but me.

I was utterly relieved by the words of Karen Maezen Miller in her book Momma Zen:
"For a long time after giving birth, I was sheathed in loathing and shame over my own body. You can be sure the child you deliver is yours, but the body it comes out of is not. ... I could not bear my nakedness, and I could scarcely bare my own body."


Gee! I'm not alone, I thought. Only months after giving birth to Little Princes our family went on a holiday with the in laws all the way to Tenerife. I told Daddy that I would rather drop dead than be seen in a swimsuit. I had not felt so insecure about my own body since my teen years. And I am a professional self-hater when it comes to how I look.

No amount of thinking "I can not hate the body that brought forth new life" did little to soothe the feeling of looking terrible. But I did find three things that helped.

First laughter with other mothers. It seems to be the best medicine to much of mother-hoods biggest sores. I am surrounded with loving, compassionate other mothers who are endowed with a healing sense of humor and a hearty laughter bright enough to make any self-doubt evaporate.

Second is the idea presented by Clarissa Pinkola Estés in her book Women Who Run With the Wolves:
"If she is taught to hate her own body, how can she love her mother's body that has the same configuration as hers? - her grandmother's body, the bodies of her daughters as well? How can she love the bodies of other women (and men) close to her who have inherited the body shapes and configurations of their ancestors? To attack a woman thusly destroys her rightful pride of affiliation with her own people and robs her of the natural lilt she feels in her body no matter what height, size, shape she is. In essence, the attack on women's bodies is a far-reaching attack on the ones who have gone before her as well as the ones who will come after her."


I can not teach my Princesses to love and respect their bodies, if I spend time hiding my own body and feeling disgusted with it. And I do look like my beloved aunt and my grandmother even - every day a little bit more. How  can I hate the body that so closely reminds me of the people I love - my own family?

And the third helping was an idea that I really need to do some spiritual work to reclaim my own body - that there is nothing wrong with it for me to say, look, I love my children and will nurse them, hold them, cuddle with them and still feel at home with my own body.

So I turned to my ever-helpful friend Francesca de Grandis's book Be a Goddess. Her prayer "A Prayer that You May Love Your Body and Be Cleansed in Spirit" worked wonders. The prayer seems to capture everything that I needed to feel at home in my own body again.

I am the Goddess's beloved.
My lungs take in Her breath.
My veins run with Her red.
Blessed are the feet
that have walked my path
of trials and pleasures.
My hands are Her hands.
I am God as surely as
I created the universe at the beginning.
I need bow down to no one
nor before any deity.
My body is Her body,
glistening with the sweat of Stars.
My tears and my sex are Her gifts;
I bestow these as I will.


Goddess within and without,
fill me with the light
that exposes evil;
fill me with the light
that evil flees from;
fill me with the light
that illuminates me in my hiding,
that I may come from hiding
and bathe in the joy of the light.

In my darkest moment I wondered about the possibility of ordering a burkha on-line to hide my figure - to hide my insecurity. So there definitively was a need for light that would illuminate me in my hiding before reaching the point of no return in my escape from being seen.

And as an after-thought - everything I deeply love - my children, my horses, my dogs - seem to depend on me to be a source of positive, assuring energy. It takes a brave, self-assured mommy to rear calm, out-going and happy kids. And it takes a calm and assertive pack-leader to manage both horses and dogs safely. (And yes, I love the Dogwhisperer). Both of these tasks are too important for me to try and cheat my way through them. And they are way too important to fail. So I have all the reasons in the world to love and respect my own body as the body of the Life-Giver, the Great Mother Goddess.