Love and acceptance

Mrs Menopause gave a ‘kitchen table’ talk today. I was asked to give a short talk about the menopause to a small group of women. It was a lovely informal environment where women felt safe and could ask questions and have a discussion. I love this types of events as I feel I can connect with each individual.
 
 
I was asked to sum up what the menopause meant to me in one word!! yikes!! The word(s) are acceptance and self love. This has to come first before nutrition and exercise. If emotionally we cannot love and accept ourselves, especially at the time of menopause then all the other ‘stuff” doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter how we look or even how we are feeling, if we can’t love ourselves for who we are then we shall never be happy.
How do we get to a point where we can love ourselves unconditionally?? This has to come from age and experience and that is something we have at menopause. Great news!
I have learnt over the last few years on my menopause journey that it’s ok to be me. I have decided to put down the big stick which I regularly used to beat myself up about how I looked, behaved and was. Being kind and loving to myself takes time and practise and it feels great. I have to constantly remind myself that how I look doesn’t change who I am inside. I’ve worked hard to change the person I am on the inside for the better. This means that I haven’t had as much time to work on the outside me!! By that I mean I am not obsessed by training to look a certain way. I now listen to my body and do what it needs. Sometimes it is yoga, or I may feel the need to throw around some heavy weights and sometimes I like to zumba because it makes me smile !!
There came a time when I wanted to accept that yes I am older and will not look like I did when I was in my twenties and I’m pretty cool with that (most days ;-)). I was sick and tired of fighting myself.  I’ve gained weight, got cellulite, wrinkles and so what!! Now don’t get me wrong I still take pride in my appearance and like to look nice but not to the point of it controlling how I felt about myself.
For me these days health and mental well being are at the top of my list. What’s the point of having a ‘perfect’ body if on the inside I feel like dying?? Instead of chasing a six pack I am chasing great health and self esteem. My self esteem doesn’t come from what I look like in a bikini. I have never been happy with my body, even when I was my leanest I wanted more. If my esteem came from how I looked then no wonder I was miserable.
Today I practice to love and accept myself for who I am, warts and all!! I don’t get this right all the time as this thinking is ingrained in me for years. Life is way too short to waste any more time hating how I look and letting it dictate my emotions.
What I do want is to show my ten year old daughter that being beautiful isn’t about having model good looks. I don’t want her to go through all the wasted years of self loathing that I have. If I can teach her now that beauty really does come from within then she will have the self esteem and confidence I lacked in the first forty years of my life.
So now I look in the mirror and am grateful for the body I have!! There are plenty of people who are not blessed with a fully working body and would love to have legs let alone worrying about fat thighs. I now chase health and mental well being and have thrown away the scales!!
I have a feeling that my post menopause years are going to kick sand in the face of my youth. Woo hoo!!!