Body faming

For those who are unfamiliar with the concept, 'body shaming' is a practice whereby those in the media make comments or judgements about someone's weight or physical features. Now, as someone whose body has had a sound pummelling for three and a half years now, I thought I would give it a little boost. I'm going to call this 'body faming'.

So here are my top ten reasons for putting my beleaguered body into my own personal hall of fame:

1. It was injected with poison for six months and had to go on overdrive, ejecting all sorts of nasties out of my system (albeit in a rather undignified fashion).

2. It was subjected to high energy waves of radiation for three weeks...twice!

3. It helped to fight infection even when my resistance was super low.

4. It made a concerted effort to re-populate my bald head with hair...twice! And it kept me guessing with different textures and colours.

5. It communicated with me using its sophisticated alarm system whenever it felt like there was something I needed to know.

6. It carried on repairing itself even when my brain was operated on and my head sewn back together...you've guessed it...twice!

7. It tolerated all sorts of efforts to undermine its functionality and kept on going.

8. It remained stoic as it was pumped full of steroids, and then quietly built its own strength to counteract this change.

9. It survived multiple scans, X-rays, invasive treatments, injections and surgeries and didn't give up.

10. It wears its scars with pride, as do I.

Today, I am celebrating my body and all its imperfections. It's brave and strong, resilient and determined. It deserves to be celebrated and not in any way shamed. It's a gift from God and its incredible, mind-blowing intricacy has served me well. Your lumps and bumps are irrelevant (but get anything new checked out anyway), it's the steel inside that counts.

Amanda