Winter

Barren branches told me this morning that a new season has arrived.  The streets are messy with dead, fallen leaves and the skies are a soft wintry gray.  I noticed this morning the deep brown trunks of leafless trees lining the road as I drove in to work.

Fronts push through one right after another, not leaving us frozen or snowed in, but cold enough that it makes me want to stay inside and make foods rich with warmth and comfort.  It's the time of year when I wear out my crock pot and my large handled mugs and cozy blankets.  We use our heater sparingly and keep warm with woolen socks, cuddles and down comforters.

Winter is the time for quiet.  To be still and rest.  It reminds me of loss and death and how all things need a time to wait, to sit, to die before spring can revive and renew everything all over again.

Including me - my heart, my body, my soul

Every day, my body grows with expectance and I must sit and rest more than I would care to.  Resting means I can't be productive and control the world around me.  I can't manage or be in charge as I'm at the mercy and grace of others to help me with things that need getting done.  I need help shaving my legs and gathering up the laundry because the third trimester for me means excruciating lower back pain.  

I'm forced to ask for help.  I'm forced to rest.

It's not my favorite season.  I hate feeling the sting of biting, cold air once the holidays are over and packed away in storage bins and memory books.  I hate how "needy" I am during my third trimester and fight feelings of being only a burden to others.  Ordinarily, I find myself trying to stay busy through the winter in efforts to make it pass by quickly.  If I pack my schedule tight or make to-do lists miles long full of projects around the house, I can speed through the season and spring will be here before I know it.

Resting often makes me feel restless and I am so prone to resist the resting.  I tend give in to the lies that I'm good for nothing if I can't DO. Yet I see where rest is needed - especially now.  My body is made to slow down in preparation for what is to come.  When spring brings new life and activity and change.  The rest will provide me the energy and strength I need.  When it is once again time for the doing.

I find myself wondering how to embrace my winter, my third trimester - this season I'm in before I become a mother of two.  What it might look like to rest and how this season is made for all things to sleep and wait.  I'm curious what gifts might be found in such a season if I take the time to notice.  And what might happen if I stopped resisting what I need and let things go and just stay warm under my blankets for awhile.  To hold my belly tight and rest until spring gives birth to all things new.

The time I took a picture of my pregnant-belly....on purpose

When I was pregnant with Tommy, I took absolutely ZERO pregnant pictures of myself. I was so incredibly ashamed of my size that I didn't want any pictures to show record of how "huge" I was.  Being very overweight and with child, I almost felt like some freak of nature and I felt like hiding most of the time, especially toward the end of my pregnancy.  I had a very hard time accepting myself and being kind to myself where I was at.

This time around, I have faced some of those familiar demons.  I've had those mornings where all of my clothes end up on the floor of my closet and I'm in tears and collapse on my bed in frustration because I'm convinced that everything looks horrible on me.  That would be quite true.  Though I think that almost every pregnant woman goes through this, overweight or not.

The food thing has been different for quite some time.  I don't eat in secret or binge anymore and over-eating is a rare occurrence.  My eating feels more normal and is slowly becoming more balanced.  I'm hopeful that things will continue as they have this year as I've been becoming a less disordered eater.

But what feels the most different for me is that I haven't carried the same shame this time around.  In some ways, it's been easier to find kindness for myself.  For my heart, for my body, and for where I am at in recovery from a nearly life-long binge eating disorder. Really, I owe all of that to the grace of God.  He has brought healing and peace and restoration to places in my heart and my story that haven't been there before.  It's changed me inside and out.

Evidence?  I took a picture of myself on purpose this morning.  Not only for me to have, but publicly for the whole world to view.  It's on Instagram and Facebook and everyone will see it - there's no hiding pregnant Jenn this time.  And actually, I don't want to hide her.

This picture makes me smile.  Because I took it and because I want to share it.  Because I know who that woman is.

She's a woman who is life-giving.  She is a woman learning to live fully in the present.  She doesn't check out of her pain.  She names truth for herself and for others.  She is fierce and she's a fighter.  She is brave.  She's a woman who will be celebrating a monumental anniversary on the 27th of December - going an entire year without having a binge.  (THIS IS A BIG FRICKIN' DEAL PEOPLE!  WHO-HOO!)  She's a woman who is closer to Jesus than she's ever been.  She is closer to her husband and allows him to enjoy her instead of pushing him away.  She's a woman that I have more kindness and acceptance and grace for.  I don't hate on her as much as I used to.  She is a mom - to one, soon to be two, beautiful boys.  She's learning to trust and rest and hope and wait because it's where God has asked her to go and how He wants her to live.

She is a woman, free from the chains of self-contempt and self-loathing.  Free to laugh loudly and dance and take pictures of her growing tummy full of life.  Growing, struggling, wrestling, and living daily in the abundant grace of God.

This is not just a picture of a pregnant belly.  It's a picture of repentance and beauty and triumph.  And a glorious page in my story that God continues to beautifully author.