Dear 16 Year Old Me

In your face!
Ok, no. But really...

I thought about you last night while I was running. Let me back up. I just discovered Songza, and had an awesome 90's running songs playlist going while I was running. As Jennifer Lopez belted out "Let's Get Loud", my mind wandered to memories of high school, and how I felt about my body back then.

You know how you started swimming and track and field because you aren't very good at team sports? Some days you feel so frustrated because even though you are better at those things than you are at basketball, you still get winded after running one kilometre
I just want to encourage you to not get too depressed about it or obsess about it. Go ahead and be competitive with yourself, push to be better, but also know that this is not as good as it gets. Adults will tell you, "if you think you have fat on your body now, just wait until you have kids!" and other gems of wisdom.
And to a point, they are right. There will be a few years when you really hate your body. You will love the fact that you have been blessed with children...four beautiful daughters who make you smile, but you will also look back at your high school body lots and wish you could go back to that, even for a day.

Some days, when hormones are high and motivation is low, you will even cry about it....you will stand there, look into the mirror and cry. One time, when you are pregnant with your first daughter, you will have a conversation with a lady who is already a mom. She will tell you how after she had her first baby, she would lay on her side and her tummy skin would just slump onto the bed beside her. You'll never forget that...and when it happens to you for the first time, you'll be sad. You will swear that you are going to work to "get your body back" over and over, and you will give it some good shots. But again and again things will get in the way to prevent it....whether it's excuses, the craziness of life with kids, or another pregnancy, there will be times when you feel like you may just be this way forever. And you'll hate that thought.

I know that doesn't sound encouraging, but hear me out.
Let's jump right back up to last night. Remember when I said I was running? Yeah, well here's the part that you might not believe right now.
At 16, you have a nice body, and it is easy to maintain. In fact, you eat fries almost every day with your friends and your body forgives you so easily and never seems to change! In 13 years it won't be as easy, but when you sit back and think about it, you will be so much prouder of yourself and of your body than you ever thought you could be!
Do you have any idea what your body will go through in the next 16 years? You will grow 4 babies inside of you, give birth to them, and then feed them using your body. That alone takes up about 6 full years. And then, in your quest to stay healthy and get back into shape after having those babies, you will do things you never thought you could do.
You will be able to run further than you can as a teenager, and will even run your first half marathon. You will lift weights and do burpees like nobody's business! At first you won't be able to do as many pushups as you can now, or as long of a wall sit...but one day you will surpass what you can do at 16.

You will never have your "pre-pregnancy" body back, but maybe that's a good thing. I'm starting to think it is, and I wouldn't trade the body have now for that one. The body I have now, I have worked hard for, and it can do so much more than I ever thought it could before.

It will be hard some days, but as you are nearing your fifth mile on the treadmill, with old school Jennifer Lopez blaring on your iPhone, you might just find yourself thinking, "look what I'm doing! I couldn't even run this far in high school!" And you will be proud of yourself, and proud of your body for all that it has done for you, and all that you can do for it now.