"I'm a Manatee" - On Learning Better Self Talk

My husband's been getting on me lately for how I talk about myself.

Being pregnant is hard in many ways. It's joyful and wonderful and exciting, but it's also hard. My back aches. I have trouble sleeping. My skin is being stretched to the point where I can almost hear it crying out in agony... (In case you're wondering what that sounds like, in my head it sounds like, "Eeeeeeeeeeeee!")

When all of these things converge, I get cranky. And when I get cranky, I start trash-talking myself.

"I'm a huge," I told my husband yesterday. "I'm a manatee."

--Photo borrowed from B B Entertainer

"You're beautiful," he responded. (See why I married him?)

"Okay then," I said. "I'm a beautiful manatee." I thought this would get a laugh. It didn't.

"Sweetie," he said, gently but firmly, "You need to stop saying things like that about yourself. Pregnancy is beautiful. What is happening to your body is normal and wonderful and miraculous. You are doing great. Say it."

"I am doing great," I said, with a sigh.

"Say it like you mean it," he said.

"Doing great," I said.

"Okay, now stop with all the negativity. You are beautiful. And your body is taking care of our little one. What it is doing is awesome. I'm really proud of you."

I married a great guy, didn't I? So often he is the voice of God in my life, reminding me of what's true. A good marriage should work like this, I think. He speaks God's truth into the parts of my life that are broken or bent or just plain messed up. I speak God's truth into the parts of his life that are full of struggle or anxiety. We remind each other of what is true.

I know I'm not alone among women in bashing myself. We women have a lot of trouble with negative self-talk, don't we? I hear women in my church talking negatively about themselves all the time. It breaks my heart.

Whether it's about our size or our weight or our parenting abilities or our work skills or our feelings, we women are really good at trashing ourselves. We say things to ourselves that we would never, ever say to another woman--it'd be far too cruel!

For example, how often have you heard (or thought, or even said?) the following:

"I'm so huge."

"I really need to go work out."

"I can't believe I said that. I sounded so stupid."

"No wonder I don't have any _____" (Fill in the blank: friends, money, well-behaved children, etc.)

"Of course no one will hire me."

"What was I thinking?!"

"I wouldn't want to be my friend, either."

It can get real ugly, real fast.

--Photo borrowed from The Daily Mail.

Maybe you're farther along the Christian path than I am, but I struggle with the self-talk. I struggle to let my mistakes go, to move on in faith and freedom, to tell myself God's truth rather than my own lies. It's particularly hard when it comes to body image--something many, if not most, women struggle with from time to time.

The thing is, this negative self talk really hurts us. It wounds us. It shames us. And most importantly, it is not what God would say to his beloved daughters, and it is not what God calls us to say to ourselves.

There's a beautiful, simple song we sing in church sometimes called "A Shield About Me." It's taken from Psalm 3, a Psalm that speaks of God's rescuing love. The lyrics are as follows:

Thou, O Lord are a shield about me.
You're my glory; you're the lifter of my head.


Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, you're the lifter of my head.

--Photo borrowed from Traditional Music

The times in my life when I've been really and truly ashamed, it's been hard for me to even lift my head. I want to hide, to run, to stew in my shame. I can't believe I said that. I can't believe I look like that. I can't believe I made that mistake. Yet God is our shield. Our glory. The lifter of our heads. When we are ashamed, he speaks his resounding truth to us. He lifts up our heads.

I'm working on the self-talk. It's downright hard to go from my normal clothing sizes to not even fitting in my husband's shirts, pregnancy or no. It's tough not to be my own harshest critic when things don't go as I've hoped during a Sunday at church. It's tough to accept that I'm a human person with human failings who will always make some mistakes.

Yet I know that God calls me to something better. To walking with him. To resting in him. To speaking his truth--both to others, and to myself.

So maybe I'm not really a manatee. I'm just a pregnant woman whose body is getting ready for a baby. I'm trying to get there. I really am.

What true things do you need to tell yourself today?