Battle wounds

After the birth of my first child, I remember sitting in my tub, sore, tired, and unsure of my role as a new mother. I was so sore at that time that is was very difficult for me to get up, and I just started crying. I felt a little like my body had betrayed me. I had big bright red stretch marks and a flabby tummy. Not to mention the fact that my body was not exactly what society portrayed as beautiful. My body had changed so much that it sort of felt out of place on me.

Now after my fifth, I find the same sort of thing happening. I have changed so many times, it is strange to think that there was ever a time when my stomach didn't look like a flat tire around my waste. But now, I look at these things as trophy of motherhood. My scars were made from bringing a life here. My stretch marks and stomach brought forth an angel. My muscles, now gone, once held a child. These wounds were all made as I nurtured a new soul about to come forth. As a soldier is honored for his sacrifice and pains, so I honor my own battle wounds and accept my own sacrifice as something worthy and honorable.
My own battle wounds not only remind me of my own sacrifice for life, but of my mothers, and her mothers before her. In a chain unbroken, I honor the lives of the women who sacrifice to bring forth a new generation. Not only in giving birth, but in loving and caring and raising those who would then love and care for other children.