Motherly Thoughts

So, I love conference as I'm sure most of you do. I'd have to say that I'm still thinking about Elder Ballard's talk on Mother-Daughter relationships for obvious reasons. I loved it. Ate up every word. So, as I will soon be a mother of a sweet little girl, I kind of wanted to jot down and share some thoughts I had about my wonderful mom.

• First of all, my mom is wonderful! I love her. These are some points that I have been truly grateful for her.
• As Elder Ballard brought up: If mothers are thrifty, so are their daughters; if they are modest, so are their daughters. I love that my mom has taught me so well by her wonderful example.
• My mom is the most wondeful visiting teacher. Unfortunately this is not something that I have yet picked up from my mom since I am horribly inconsistent at visiting teaching. Some of my mom's best friends have come from visiting teaching and she has a great testimony of it. Hopefully someday I'll have as much dedication for it as she does.
• Elder Ballard also brought up teaching sexual purity. My mom told me that if I ever got pregnant, then she would kill me. I'm glad that she set me straight at an early age that I would die if I ever broke the law of chastity. Being alive was obviously important enough that I made it through until I got married. :) I'm also very grateful that she was so open to talking to me about the subject as he directed in conference. I think that is super important.
• SOAPBOX: One of the BIGGEST things that I'm so grateful for is my mom's opinion about weight issues. This has been a big thing for me lately. I know we as women struggle with our body image (I have yet to meet a woman who doesn't) even if it's only slightly. In a world where we are bombarded with how we should look, if we're skinny or not, there seems to always be something that we should alter. If we're skinny, then our boobs aren't big enough. If we're normal size, then our hips are too large. If we're heavier, then we weigh too much. If we're pregnant, we're expanding too much and will never look the same afterwards or we have to get that "aweful" baby weight off. I can't even tell you how sad this makes me. Being a psychology student I've studied eating disorders over and over again and they break my heart. It makes me sad that no matter what phase of life we're in, we're never happy and we always are working to be something that we think is more beautiful instead of feeling beautiful the way we are. Now, I was always one of those, I'm normal size with really big hips girls. I was always complaining about how big my tush was or how wide my hips were. Everytime I would mention anything negative about how I looked my mom would always reassure me that I was beautiful! Every. Single. Time. She wouldn't really leave it at that, she would encourage me to say positive things and make sure that I knew that being a normal size was okay and beautiful. Not everyone can be ultra skinny, nor would we want to be. She encouraged me to be active and healthy (and yes, she would hide the chocolate chips so I wouldn't eat them all…..if we ever did have chocolate chips in the house.) Being a teenager I didn't really "listen" to her at the time since I always complained, but looking back I am so so soooo grateful that my mom never said, "Looks like you're getting pudgy there. Let's go on a diet" or "You need to start running" or "Don't eat those carbs, they're not as good for you. Here's some celery." All my friends that I know who had something like that happen in their lives all have weight issues and it makes me sad. Why can't we eat healthy and exercise just to be healthy? Why does it have to reflect how beautiful we are or have it be a goal of always losing poundage? URG! It makes me upset! Now, call me crazy, but I LOVE being pregnant. I think it is a miracle and who the heck cares what you look like or how much weight you're gaining as long as you're being healthy and happy. Don't get me wrong, I understand the importance of being healthy, but it can easily be taken to extremes. I just don't get it. Maybe some of you can enlighten me, but what is so wrong with women getting bigger when they're pregnant? I, for one, wanted to look pregnant right away because I think people look adorable pregnant. Being happy and excited about being pregnant is such an important thing to me. Anyway, (back to my point) I hope that I can be just as helpful as my mom has been to me. I hope that my little girl can grow up with confidence and feel happy no matter what she looks like. I'm glad that my mom made our home somewhere where I could escape the images portrayed at school, the movies, and other media and be a beautiful daughter of God. Thanks mom!
• I'm also very grateful that my mom and I can listen and learn from one another. She really is my best friend. No other person would be so wonderful as I call her in the middle of the night to make sure my pregnant body is functioning properly and laugh about it. I call her for the dumbest reasons and she always is happy and excited when no one else will be. She is also so level headed and is always teaching me how to be a better person when I call her and vent about something stupid.

As I'm sure all of your mothers are too, but my mom is the best. :)