I came across this quote while I was putting together a mini motivational poster for our workout room. It really hit a nerve.
I have four stepkids, and I have always been an active stepmom, long before my husband and I got married. I don’t see a point to half-assing anything. I’m either in or out of the kids’ lives, and if I’m in, I’m all in. I have been at my husband’s side for school events, sporting events, church, teacher conferences, awards ceremonies, you name it.
A parent’s job is to raise strong kids who grow into independent, thoughtful, productive adults. I worry about the kids all the time, especially when our efforts to build them up are deliberately and routinely torn down by others.
The kids are only with us sometimes. They also live with their egg donor, Psycho. More than once, the kids have sadly made a comment to me, usually while watching me get ready to leave for the gym or while I’m working out at home, like “Mom says she doesn’t have time to work out. She says she’s too busy taking care of us” or some variant of her “losing herself” when she had kids, or when she got married, or some other occasion that should be celebrated as a happy time of her life, not an opportunity to pawn guilt onto the kids, or an ex-husband who was forced to escape her.
Having kids changes your life, no doubt about it. My world was shaken up, tossed around, and rearranged until I didn’t recognize it, when I met my husband and the kids. I had a choice to either fly solo and continue with life as I knew it, or accept that my life is now far more about four children than it is about me.
Of course it’s different being a stepmom than the one who gave birth. But all of the kids are old enough now that the timeframe for using the kids as an excuse for extra weight has long expired, anyway. And that’s not what my post is about. I get that being pregnant adds baby weight and changes your body, even if I’ve never experienced it personally. The pressure to lose that weight as fast as humanly possible, at the expense of all else, is patently absurd. Over a decade later, however, that topic is no longer relevant.
I’m talking about using the kids as a lame excuse for remaining overweight. The kids have mentioned it enough times that it is obvious they hear it from Psycho ad nauseam. She is overweight because of them. It’s not her fault, it’s theirs. She would have time for exercise if it wasn’t for them. (Apparently she’d be a fitness model if it wasn’t for them, to hear her talk.)
It’s so ridiculous that it would be laughable if it didn’t hurt the kids’ feelings so deeply. Psycho had no job for at least half of this past year, with eight hours a day wide open while the kids were in school. She has no adult responsibilities, since her daddy pays all her bills, so are we really supposed to believe she had no time for workouts? Please.
But the kids don’t logically rationalize it out like that. They accept the blame, completely and unquestioningly, and they feel guilty for…what? Being born? Existing? That is disgustingly unfair.
I am overweight. I don’t deny it. I also don’t blame my husband or kids for it. They don’t cram food down my throat or tie me to a chair so I can’t work out. It would be convenient to blame them, but I make plenty of bad choices all on my own and don’t need any help in that department! I would never foist responsibility for my poor decisions onto the kids, who have absolutely nothing to do with it.
In fact, it should be the opposite: the kids should be my (and others’) motivation, not a cheap and easy excuse. The kids were so proud of me when I was losing weight and getting into shape before the wedding. It was a huge motivation for me. I am ashamed that I let that go. I need to get back at it, let them see that I didn’t give up, that they are a momentous reason I want to push forward and work hard. I want them to feel positive and proud, happy and confident, and see that they are a shining star, a bright spark, for me. 
Sweat & Sparkle 