I almost don’t recognize this girl sometimes.
I have intentionally put on 14 lbs of muscle in the past 2 years. Before that I was the “skinny girl”. Arms like tooth picks, super thin legs, even my shoulders/collar bone area looked completely different.
I wasn’t unhappy with what I looked like, not at all actually. I just didn’t know anything else was possible for me. Super thin was my norm.
I WAS in fact unhappy with how I felt every day. Lethargic. Zero endurance. No strength. Nauseated constantly. Sick every morning. Never an appetite. Always dehydrated. It wasn’t a fun place to be. But that was also my normal. No matter how much I ate, that is what I knew.
Until I decided to take control of my body and start building my way to healthy.
It’s been a long journey, one I’m still working on every single day to keep getting better and more importantly keep FEELING better but I have literally made a 180 from where I used to be.
And sometimes when I look at myself now, I don’t recognize my own body.
Adjusting to having a thicker figure was something I didn’t expect to even be a thing. Maybe because it happened slowly or the change was gradual, but it certainly has been something I’ve had to adjust to, especially mentally.
Because I guess when you’re so used to being one way physically your entire life, even when you make intentional changes for the better, it’s something new to accept about yourself and get used to.
There was literally a period of time where I wouldn’t put on shorts (let alone a swimsuit) because I was super uncomfortable with how much bigger my butt has gotten (even though that was a goal) it was new, and weird, and uncomfortable as hell.
So I made a point to force myself to wear shorts. To take pictures and acknowledge the changes. To LOVE what I was creating an accept it as my new normal.
In the journey of learning and building my body for the better, I’ve had to learn to appreciate myself in a whole new light… get comfortable in my own skin again.
While it’s been an unexpected part of the journey, it’s just allowed me to get even deeper in love with myself at my core and yesterday, when this photo was taken I wasn’t self conscious at all. Not flexing, not posing, just purely being myself. .And that my friends, feels fucking awesome.