Last year, I talked to my friend B about what it means to have a “bawdy like a motha”. That conversation (which you can find here) got me thinking. By the end of the year, I felt challenged to get my body together. Internally and externally. Because I always go big and never home, I decided I was going to run a marathon at the end of this year, so I’ve been training daily. This morning…was a time.

Here’s my “note to self” after my workout-

“I had to catch myself this morning. I almost said the dreaded words ‘I hate my body’.

It wasn’t moving and maneuvering the way it did a few years ago. I never had to try this hard or put in as much effort as I do now. I feel every pound on my body, especially what I carry in the middle. I know we are in a world of “unbigging our backs” and its positive and negative narratives on both sides but as for me and my house, I genuinely want a healthy, snatched body. I want to age gracefully and preferably with a limited amount of aches pains and various sounds when I move. I also wanna be able to put it zownnn when I get married so that means I need stamina and strong knees.

So today as I moved through my mobility workout I felt, for a brief moment, that I hate my body. I hated that she wouldn’t stop wobbling in this lunge I could literally do with my eyes closed a few years ago, yet today I felt like I’d topple over with the wind. Mind you I just did my upper body right before and I was so proud of how strong I’d gotten. The narrative changed in a matter of minutes and I had to grab hold of my thoughts. My body is not failing me and I am not failing her. For one I just had my cycle so give yourself a break babygirl! You quite literally lost a lot of strength just by breathing last week. And yet you showed up… for the most part (I may or may not have missed a day or 2). And then you had the audacity to decide that you would KEEP showing up this week and go just a little harder. 

This world is already unkind to you. This skin that you are in seems to be a welcome sign for some to throw hate, disgust, and jealousy. So what we won’t do is jump on that bandwagon. 

Yea this work is hard.

The living work.

The prep work.

The mothering work.

But you still show up daily with your best for that day and you move in a body that wants to move with you. So be gentle with you. 

You are relearning so much in this space of your life. Let the most important thing you learn and hold on to be to love you and this body.”

So if you’re anything like me and you’re hyper-critical as you jump into or back into something you haven’t done consistently for years, I beg, be gentle and kind with you. Give you grace and love. We’re entering a season laced with unknowns. Some of us don’t quite have a full grasp on our roles in this revolution (I hope you aren’t naive enough to think you don’t have a part to play because you do), so the least we can do is grab those thoughts that want to box us in, hold us back, or push us down and tell them to kiss our…

-Love you, mean it

Ja’Nelle Nichole

These images are for accountability and a reminder that it’s okay to start slow and build.