The Female Body After Children

I have just had the rudest shock I’ve had in a long time...... the last time I did a 90’s style aerobic workout was in the 90’s.  You know the type – where you do a Richard Simmons/Aerobics Oz Style/Denise Austin type coordinated jogging moves on the spot with hands and feet going in all directions.  But everything is “newer and better” so I had no idea what I got myself into.....

Given it is the new millennium and many industries are heading towards corporate monopolies, there is limited “freestyle” aerobics anymore where you do something different each week from the instructor’s imagination.  NO, we now have the dominating force in the fitness world which is Les Mills classes. Too bad if you don’t like doing systemised workouts because most gyms have invested in Les Mills because you can’t get instructors anymore that aren’t indoctrinated into the Les Mills workout theology and  marketing force .  So the only choice of class to get my cardio up is Les Mills Body Attack.  And the name is no exaggeration.  It was nonstop frenetic epileptic type movements to hard core techno music.

The thing is, since I last did one of these classes in the 90’s (and I’m sure they weren’t this full on) a lot has changed – namely the level of gravity factor my body now has.  10.5.

So I found myself in this class surrounded by Gen Y’s  in the gear I wear to gym which doesn’t account for jiggle and bounce factor.  Half way through the warm up one boob started to descend down and to the left and the other one was trying to escape out the top and my leggings were riding up around my ribs. I actually think I had a “camel toe”!   I was literally falling apart in front of the mirror but was not game to stop otherwise I will be run over by the stampede!

Nothing is ruder than finding out all of a sudden exactly how many parts move on your body that you didn’t even know could move.  The other curious thing that happens after you have kids is that with all the belly and boob action, your butt feels like it’s missing out and thinks it is a competition and starts to grow to prove itself!

Maybe other mothers are aware of their jiggle factor gradually over time because they kick a football around with the kids or jump on the trampoline.  But I honestly did not know because I have only for the first time in seven years got my strength and fitness up enough to start to do normal activities since having children.  I have always had a dodgy back due to an extra half vertebra in my lower spine, but childbirth caused havoc.   I had to do a rehab type program with a physio over the last 7 years to stabilise spine and hip problems after and during my pregnancies.  Even walking up steps was a challenge.  Everything I did had a measured and precise approach with core stability in mind and Pilates was the only exercise I was allowed to do. I certainly had no opportunity to jump and jiggle around.  It has been a slow and gradual climb to get back up to normal movement. 

So my sense of achievement that I can finally start to do normal things again, including cardio exercise, has been completely marred by this rude reality check of how much my body has aged while I’ve been getting back normal mobility.  And the sad thing is that regardless of how fit I get, my skin is never going to shrink!  I mean let’s face it girls, there are some freaks out there that can shrink back but for many of us no matter how well we eat, exercise or smear magical creams on, our body looks like someone else has lived there.  A bit like a house that has had squatters.  And that’s because someone else HAS lived there!  Falling pregnant and giving birth is in fact a parasitic relationship – we actually grow another human being in our own body using all of our own resources – yes albeit amazing but quite taxing on your body.

So given I have no regrets about my children and am learning to love myself I will just have to get used to becoming comfortable with my new reality.  So I am now prepared for the next class – I dug out a pair of leggings that are size 10 so the tightness should act as a containment device and I bought a workout top from Bras n Things that straps me in like the bandage job that Barbara Streisand wore in Yentl while posing as a young Jewish boy. Hopefully I won’t expire from lack of oxygen. 

I’m very grateful given how many Gen Ys that attend this class that so far no one has videotaped their workout or else I could end up as the new viral laughing stock on You Tube.

Article on weight and stress management

I will post an article tomorrow, but I just read a great article from a health expert, Jon Barron,  who I subscribe to. http://www.jonbarron.org/natural-health/obesity-music-change-brain-newsletter I thought anyone interested in managing their weight, stress and environmental factors might find it interesting.  It also was very inspiring and confirming for me that I'm on the right path in relation to the scientific back-up for improved health from spiritual focus, meditation and changing behaviour and brain patterns through cognitive behavioural therapy, a topic I want to include in my resources section.

I hope you enjoy reading the article!

Here is the link
In this newsletter, Jon explores how you can actually override some of the physical changes that have been forced on your brain -- changes that force you to eat too much or stress out too easily, for example. With conscious effort, you can actually "repair" areas of your brain that have been previously altered to your detriment. This is hugely liberating and life-altering if you choose to act on it. (Click here to read article...)

Mental Illness and Being "Shrunk"

I just broke up with my shrink....well at the end of the year,   but I wanted to give her notice and the opportunity to really hone in on things if it is needed.  I made a commitment to see it through for 18 months to fully dredge once and for all.  Breaking up is huge because this woman knows more about me than anyone else.  I basically pay her to reveal all – every resentment, pain, hurt, fear, emotion, action and dysfunction. One thing I am sure of is that with the life I live and the colourful characters in it, I’m sure she has not been bored!

I really have come a long way – I have come from starting the first session pointing out the key performance indicator that a potential patient uses is “Please tell me that I’m nuts enough that you’ll keep seeing me!!!” to having a six month period with relative stability and peace of mind.

Now you may think that seeing someone every week for 18 months equates to being stark raving mad – which is not a totally wrong conclusion, but it more relates to the type of therapy.  After seeing a number of therapists over a 10 year period and either not committing to a long term process or not feeling they were the right person to treat me, I went back to this psychiatrist who I saw 6 years before.  I stopped therapy because it became too hard going both logistically and mentally after the birth of my first child.  So I returned to her to finish the job.  If you think it is hard to find the right mechanic or hairdresser, try finding the right therapist! 

My Doc is what’s called a “Psychodynamic therapist” as opposed to psychologist or cognitive behavioural therapist.  This basically means I go there, talk for 50 minutes and leave – often with a stop to the dunny which is basically one of the few places in my world where I can cry in peace because there is no child, elderly person or someone on the end of the phone wanting something from me.  My therapist gives very little feedback and I know absolutely NOTHING about her personally.  If I ask her opinion on something she won’t give it but asks me what I think. She does pose questions and makes suggestions but ultimately I have to arrive at the conclusion.  She will not give me a definitive response.  

You have to trust in the process – that talking unprompted on a week to week basis about the things that come up in your life will act as a longitudinal study over time that reveals to you (and your subconscious) the patterns of behaviour, themes and triggers that guide your existence.  As you start to recognise these and explore the root causes you can catch yourself at the top of a downward spiral and create new patterns of behaviour to replace the dysfunctional ones. 

I don’t think it is all her though.  As a devout Christian I have approached this in a prayerful way asking God to bless the process, reveal what needs to come up and give me the courage to face the fear of opening a can of worms -  and being assured God will never leave me alone trying to shove the slippery suckers back into the can!  I might be challenged but never alone or incapable of getting through. I do a Christian mediation in my favourite “happy spot” looking out on the river just before my therapy session so I am prepared.  I am amazed at how things have come up in therapy and then been directly confirmed and the way out laid down in front of me in my spiritual life. I have often unravelled something in therapy and then been able to really specifically pray and study to come up with the answer and be “released” from the problem.  Both God and my therapist (who I suspect has other beliefs than mine) have guided me out of the mess in my head that I’ve been stuck in for so long.

So given I am now officially qualified to make this statement, I am going to be a sane self righteous pratt for just a few moments.  Listen up.......

For people who make judgements about people who see therapists and believe all this self examination is a bit self absorbed and queer and you should just snap out of it... it is better to get help than be unaware or unwilling to do anything about your own dysfunction and the heartache you inflict on the people around you.  

For Christians that believe  God can help anyone who asks to reveal to them the things they need to work on and then heal them, sometimes God uses people ,  medicine and science to do a work of healing.  He often employs a process rather than a miraculous fix.

For people that are afraid of opening “Pandora’s box” and think it would all be too painful...the pain inflicted by your subconscious is already ruling your conscious life.  You’re better to eyeball it and get it done and dusted so it doesn’t control you anymore.  Just because pain lurks under the surface does not mean it is contained.  Pain and unforgiveness silently leaches into every pore of your existence and subconsciously lurks tainting every experience and the ability to truly feel joy and freedom.

 And lastly, want to hear my theory on aging gracefully?  Get your stuff dealt with while you are young and before your body and mind gets too exhausted to do the hard yards.   I think the key to being happy in old age is directly correlated to how much of your baggage you have psychologically offloaded during your life.  If you leave it until the end when everything is wearing out and you don’t have the capacity to deal with it, it starts to infiltrate in other forms.  For example, could it be that dementia is the mind’s way of escaping what it no longer has the capacity to suppress or deal with and without life’s distractions it has no other choice than to go off somewhere?  

It’s time that everyone started to think of depression as any other form of illness in society.  If you are thinking in terms of a hierarchy of organs in our body, the fact that the brain and mind is central to everything else and the most important of all the organs, it should be prioritised.  Yet when we seek to have a healthy brain it can be viewed with trepidation or fear that is not viewed the same way than if it was a cancer getting cut out.  Surely it is time that our society embraces the importance of looking after this most essential organ without shame.  

Gillard the Goose

School holidays are always full of action, but this one is especially busy due to settling into our suburban barnyard our newly acquired goose, Gillard.

One Sunday night dinner a few weeks ago the family was gathered to have a farewell dinner for our Grandma’s carer who is sadly leaving us and going back home to NZ.  My sister-in law, who also secretly would love to be a farm girl, said that her heart was breaking because my brother was making her send away Gillard because she was too noisy.  But it wasn’t quite that simple.  As the story unfolded so did the level of dysfunction with Honky Tonk, the gander, mating with the ducks and Gillard finding her soul mate in my brother.  She follows him around everywhere, grooms him and honks lovingly and loudly whenever she glimpses him (gives a new spin to the bumper sticker “Honk if you’re horny!”). 

It has gotten so bad that on the mornings that my brother has to take early flights to do weekly interstate work he has to skulk around his own house in the dark like a thief so that she can’t see or hear him or she wakes the whole district at 4.30am.  She protests loudly that he is about to leave her for three days and waddles around aimlessly until his joyful return.  The last straw was when he thought he could get away with a quiet and quick smoke before leaving for the airport but Gillard caught a whiff of his tobacco smoke and off she went!

So my brother decided she had to go – I think from a Freudian perspective it is quite telling – he probably would like to send off all the noisy and nagging females in his life - wife, sister and mother included, but just can’t arrange it so conveniently!

The dilemma is that Gillard is booked in to the Exhibition in August and although they have found a property she can go away to (like some disgraced teenager to a home for wayward girls), my sister-in-law wants to keep her until the EKKA.  So the family “gaggle” all noisily nagged my husband to let us have her for at least 6 weeks.

And if you think that is where it peacefully ends, think again!

Gillard is housed with our six chooks.  Given she wandered freely at my brother’s place, a long term stay is dependent on her having access to the wider yard.  This means sharing with our dog.  But the friendship has started off a big rocky based on suspicion, jealousy and confusion.  The goose warily wanders around while the dog circles widely never taking her predatory eyes off her.  It is a nerve racking standoff with  me saying CHILL... BE COOL.....It’s Gonna be ALLLL right.... We’re gonna be Cool.....sounding a bit like Samuel  L Jackson in the famous diner shootout scene in Pulp Fiction.

It all came to a climax when after trying to reward the dog by giving her treats from my pocket I just ended up enticing her  closer to me and the Goose refused to leave my side and when I offered the dog  a doggie biscuit, Gillard thought it was for her and they both swooped at the same time.  The goose then grabbed a chunk of skin and fur from between the dog’s ears, the dog yelped and backed off reluctantly with a glimmer in her pointed gaze that said “you just wait until next time.....”.  The war is now on. The chooks have also stopped laying in protest at having some big white wench stomping around on their turf and paddling in their pond (a clamshell).

And the honking problem is just beginning.  Geese are very good guard dogs and our street is busier than where she came from so it is not unusual for her to defend her property from anyone wondering down the street at night. She is also very social and wants to be with people all the time, so honks when she hears us up and about – especially early in the morning if you need to do a pee!

So in the interest of keeping on good terms with our neighbours I have asked all in the immediate vicinity if she is making too much noise and to let me know at any stage if they feel that they are being disrupted.  ALL have replied that they think it is great with smirks on their face (I’m sure they think we’re mad).  It was  confirmed  when one bloke strolled down the road to say hello for the first time in the 12 years and said that he and his wife were lying in bed cracking up laughing the other morning as they tried to identify the sound and where it was coming from.  They figured it must be a goose and the sound was coming from “the menagerie”.  He said that is their affectionate nickname for us due to the 6 chickens, dingo looking dog and madly growing pumpkin vine weaving in and out of the fence with pumpkins hanging off it on the street.  One side of our house is perfectly mowed and manicured and the other is a dirt patch with clucking, scratching and flapping coming from it.  I thought that it was a great metaphor for my psyche and life!

Hey, I think it is good for neighbourly relations – everyone likes some novelty and someone to gossip about and our house is an excursion opportunity and  tourist stop – all the parents walking kids home, oldies taking a stroll and people walking dogs actually cross the road and hang out around the fence amazed. I am providing a community service.  And in only one week Gillard has become a bit of a legend and is happily chatting with all her audiences.

My husband who is usually very quiet has expressed that he is not impressed and it WILL be only for six weeks.  Although he is normally not image conscious he said that if I keep up my barnyard antics that we’ll get a reputation as the Cannon Hillbillies and our daughter will end up in the future on “A Farmer Wants a Wife”.  He also added he’d leave me if I ever bought home a cat! We’ll see who wins the war ......