A Healing Wife's Affirmations

I’ve lived pretty openly about my struggles with self-esteem. Perhaps too openly, but that’s not the point of this particular post. 

A history of verbal abuse, rejection, insecurity and throw in some re-traumatization for good measure... that all makes for a perfectly *normal* traumatized young woman. (And I can’t emphasize the normal part enough. The more I’ve researched what happens to the brain and body through one’s healing journey, the more I’m convinced that I’m not defined by these feelings, but rather that these are things that happened to me that I’m working through. And my range of reactions is also perfectly normal based on what experts can tell us about the brain and body’s response to those traumas.) 

That said, poor self image is exhausting and debilitating. It can be all-consuming, and it has the power to ignite an obsessive beast within. 

With the help of my husband, I am still trying to reassemble all those broken pieces to figure out who this current version of Erika is. Which pieces to discard, which to keep, and which to mold and adapt or repair into something more beautiful than it was before. 

Last year I began working on writing personal affirmations based on scriptures with a group of women from many congregations. (Thanks, Nadia, for introducing this idea to us!) Some chose to share, some chose to remain private, but I believe the end game was the same: trying to view ourselves through the lens of God’s eyes. How does He see us?  How does He see me?

One month’s study was focused on affirmations related to marriage.  It was at this time that I wrestled with some of the truths I found in Ephesians 5, and truth be told I’m still wrestling with them. I’ve committed them to paper and attached them to my bathroom mirror to see every day in hopes of somehow absorbing these thoughts to replace the self-loathing ones I usually have when looking at my reflection in the mirror. 

As a married Christian woman, my body no longer belongs to me. Or at least not exclusively to me. It is jointly shared between myself and my husband. That’s because God designed it that way (Ephesians 5:22-23, 28-29). He (my husband) and I are one flesh, and some things have to change in how I see myself to build that one flesh relationship and make it as strong as it can be (with God’s help and guidance, of course).

I cannot continue to hate my body and claim to love my husband. If he is an extension of me and I of him, then I jeopardize him when I conclude I’m not worthy. I criticize him when I hate myself. I damage him when I speak negativity into myself. Somehow in my low self esteem, this picture resonates with me more than how I realize I’m hurting myself. It hurts me to think of hurting him more than it does to reflect on how I’m wounding myself.  Because of that mutual oneness designed by Our Creator, neither of us can hurt ourselves without hurting the other, and neither of us can hurt the other without hurting ourselves.  And perhaps an even deeper consideration that I hadn’t thought of until now, but what if (since we share our one flesh) I can borrow from his strength?  What if I can glean his confidence to boost my own?  That’s not to say that I don’t need to work on establishing my own proper view of self as an individual, but in my weakness, I can use his strength. I would expect him to do the same in an area in which he was weak. 

I’m closing with a list of the affirmations I wrote, but there are many connected ideas to be explored from those I’ve written here. The marriage relationship is one uniquely designed by God, and it certainly doesn’t come without brand new knowledge, understanding, and growth every day. 

❤️ I love my husband as my own body because we are one flesh. 

❤️ I love my own body as I love my husband because we are one flesh. 

❤️ I love my husband and will therefore love myself. I will take care of myself by loving my husband. 

❤️ I will take care of, nourish, and love my own body because I love (out of love for) my husband. 

❤️ I will not hate my body because I love my husband. 

❤️ Christ loves, nourishes, and cherishes me. He does not hate me.

P.S.  And I know I made a transcribing error.  I intentionally left it because I still need to learn to be okay when everything's not perfect.