While thinking of topics I wanted to talk about that really related to the first year, my mind kept coming back to my post baby body. What a amazing and crazy two years it has been. Why do you say 2? Well, almost a year of a hard pregnancy and then a very long and hard birth and finally a year of breastfeeding.

We live in such a oversexualized and photoshopped world that a post baby body is looked at with more shame and disgust than admiration and awe. The movies turn labor and delivery into a dramatic horror show instead of a beautiful and life changing moment. How we should bounce back and look after birth is often far from the reality.

If you’ve read my blog at all this past year, you know that I gained 50 lbs during my pregnancy. My body hung onto every single calorie that I ate. The crazy  part is, I didn’t start gaining weight until 18 weeks because I was so sick I lost 12 lbs. So I lost 12 lbs over 18 weeks and then in 21 weeks, I gained 50. Saying that still makes me grit my teeth. That is A LOT of weight for my 5 foot 3 inch frame.

Does the beauty and worth of the same woman change from picture to picture? No. 

Then why do I struggle with picture #2? 

The world has skewed the definition of beauty. 

I’m a part of a very small group of women, we call ourselves The Tribe. We have a secret Facebook page that allows us to get real, talk about real things, ask hard questions, find support from like minded woman. It’s a safe zone. Before you shake your head and call it a false and unreal friendship, we are all real life and in person friends too. ❤ The facebook page just lets us communicate with everyone all at once (like a group text).Some days we post jokes, some days we share our struggles. I decided to ask them to help me with this blog post.

I asked, “How do you honestly feel about your baby body?” They all agreed that I could anonymously share their answers because they were so great. Very moving. Read it as you would read Facebook comments coming one after another. Each bullet means it’s a new person talking. I’ve removed all the names. The thing I love about this group is that we are all very different. Different backgrounds, ages, religious beliefs, body types and births…. you name it, we’re different. What brings us together though is that we are all crunchy (natural minded) and we all have kids.

Here are some of their answers:

•  It took me a long time to be ok with my post baby body, but now I love it most of the time. There are things I’d like to change, but when I start to feel bad about it, I gently remind myself how freaking awesome it is! It grew two babies. It birthed two babies (like a champ). And it’s fed two babies. One baby with some supplementing and one completely on its own. Of course that kind of amazing-ness is going to show some signs of happening.
• Immediately after I am annoyed with it. Not fitting into clothes and not having stuff to wear. After 6-8 mo I feel good. Stretch marks don’t bug me at all but mine are minimal. I have a scar from a belly button ring in college… How can I really complain about scarring from child-bearing?! I mostly struggle with my body seeming to fall apart (age and disease). Like my hand hurts so bad today and I don’t know why. The varicose veins are really annoying and frustrating.
• hate hate hate my belly!!! like I look at it every morning with full on hate…..on the other hand….I love my c-sec scar. that I am proud of. no, I never wanted it..I have been opened 4 times and have 4 beautiful babies! I weigh less now than when we were married but nothing looks the same! everything hangs or flops
• I love my body! It’s taken a long time to get here, a lot of “retraining” my brain, a lot of unsubscribing to social standards (I don’t buy those horrible magazines that talk about weight loss all the time or watch any TV that is all about looks – usually reality stuff- or engage in body bashing talk or read articles about weightless or use “fitspiration”), and some days I still buy into the bs that is our social preoccupation with women’s bodies, but most of the time I don’t. I truly don’t care anymore. I don’t care how other people view what I look like. I know my worth doesn’t lie in what I look like. I think some of it has come with age, but most has come with awareness of how messed up the women’s “role” in our society is, and refusing to buy into it anymore.
  I want to help more women love their bodies too
• I agree that it helps to remember that what we are IS normal. You can apply countless creams and do countless surgeries and inject yourself with countless things to make it disappear, but that’s ABNORMAL. And like ^^^^ touched on, tv and magazines and media is so so fake. I mean… like coated in make-up and touched-up fake. You know, as a photographer, how much you can alter with the click of a button. But there’s real life beneath and all women struggle to a degree at some point. It’s a daily choice to love yourself.
• Funny I was just talking to ******* about my belly this morning. She was watching me change and said “Ew, I see your belly.” And I asked, “what do you mean, ew? My stomach shows I’m a mommy and that I have had three babies!”
  Unfortunately my own mom hates her belly from having 5 kids. And my girls asked to see her belly button and she said her stomach is ugly from having kids.
  I had to have a talk with her and tell her not to call her stomach ugly because it’s going to make them believe after having a baby they’re “ugly”. That is the last thing I want them to believe. I want them to start knowing now that a woman who carried a baby into this world is marked as a trophy and testimony to everyone and herself of her amazing accomplishment.
  I constantly remind them I’m proud of my belly. Even though I may not think it at times (especially in summer) but it’s been something I had to overcome from my moms views and I don’t want them to overcome it- it should just be a know.
  I know it’s not easy. Especially when I see other women bounce right back to their pre-pregnancy bodies and I did with the twins but not this time.
  I have been working to get my body close to what I am happy with. Not where I was. I won’t ever have the body I once had and I’m okay with that, that body doesn’t bear proof of child bearing, but I can get to a place where I am healthy and feel good about myself by taking care of my body.
• Oooo… I also think about how God never designed childbirth and motherhood to contain negativity. He created things perfectly and in perfect harmony. So the negative things are not of Him and then I try to choose to see things through His eyes. To allow myself to be annoyed by the fallen nature of things, but rejoice in His love and provision, which of course goes full circle in His love and provision in our Savior Jesus Christ. So when I have time to really think about life I find it easier to focus on God’s overwhelming love for me and then the things I don’t love so much about myself seem so meaningless in contrast. Because, they don’t matter. Not to God. And that’s the kind of love I want to share with other people. So I have to really own it to be able to share it.
• I was just thinking about how back in that time, child bearing was a MUST. And women who couldn’t have kids were basically useless. As terrible as it sounds. Women yearned to have children and women who did were glorified. So I would imagine in that time, having a body that showed proof of childbearing was a glorified body and women were very proud of it.
  Our time a culture really distorts what our bodies should look like.
• That’s a huge part of this ^^^^^^^ I grew up with a mother that wouldn’t leave the house without make up and always talked bad about her body. She honestly hates herself. It had a ginormous impact on me. I never want my children to feel bad about their bodies because of how I feel about mine. When we show distain for parts of ourselves instead of love and compassion, our children start to feel that for themselves as well. We are role models for everything, self worth especially.
• Personally – not a huge fan of my body. Luckily my boys love it. And ******* even laid his head on my belly last night while we were cuddling – he said “I love your belly mom cause it’s so big” I’m sure he meant squishy but hey, he finds comfort in it. I’ve struggled more so on the self image because of the csection I think – cause I blame my body for failing. And the scar has giving me issues and it’s painful to run. But I’ve since found a solution to it.
• Yes! I think part of it was that time period. To be a confident woman and one that was proud of her body was looked down upon. Truthfully it still is today in many ways. My mom always would talk about how awful she looked without make up or how horrible her stomach was with her stretch marks. I love my mom and she helps us out so much, but she never has been a confident woman. She doesn’t love herself or her body. She’s allowed a lot of people to walk all over her. And that was what I learned. It’s taken a lot of time to overcome all of that. I refuse to raise my girls the same way. I want them to love their bodies now, and always. I’ve also told her she is not allowed to talk bad about her body in front of them. Society’s standards on beauty are constantly changing. And usually unrealistic. I make sure they know that I love my body and it’s done some really amazing things, and continues to do so. It’s not a trophy that’s meant to stay on the shelf. It’s a well oiled machine that is meant to do countless things. Also I’ve seen so many women give birth and In different ways. Let me tell the beauty of the mother far outshines any “damage”. There is nothing more beautiful than a mother. Our stretch marks should be honored. Our stretched skin, our extra fat reserves, our scars, and so many other things are signs of something so beautiful. They should be loved and appreciated, not looked at with hate.
• I should also follow up with – I was raised the same – mom always looked presentable (and she still won’t leave the house all done up). And my dad always made comments “oh should you be eating that?” Or “I just want you to be happy” he’d never say I’m overweight or fat but he’d applaud me when I was at my skinniest. So I struggled with my weight thought out high school and ended up borderline eating disorder. It’s not something that will ever stop for me. I look in the mirror and don’t see an amazing body that’s done so many things etc. I’m programmed to think – ugh those extra pounds do not look good. Luckily – I like eating – but I doubt I’ll ever love how I look. I won’t ever voice it in front of my kids though.
• The irony is that in Namibia older women, Memes, are all delightfully plump which is what they aspire to look like. It means they don’t have to work out in the field anymore and can relax. I was always complemented on how fat I was getting after a weekend away from my village. Such a different view of beauty.
• So right after having ********* I was very proud of my body. It had carried a baby, gave birth to that baby, and then proceeded to feed that baby. After a few months I was frustrated though for not being able to fit into my clothes and I hate my stretch marks. I working on getting past the way my stretch marks look. I’ve even promised myself that next summer I will wear a bikini. Simply because I was comfortable in a bikini before I had stretch marks even when I weighed more than I do now, so I refuse to let the stretch marks keep me from wearing what I want. Weight has always been a big issue though. My mom was picked on severely by her father for being chunky. She was also picked on in school for it. She never said bad things about my weight but would say things like “I just don’t want you to be made fun of.” I don’t blame her for those things. She genuinely just didn’t want me to go through the same thing she did. I feel the same way about my baby sister. I would never say anything but I am afraid she will be picked on in school and I feel like maybe she already has been. She recently asked me how much I weighed and I told her. She replied with “I’m only 7 and weigh a 100 pounds and you are 23 and only weigh 55 pounds more than me.” I just said that weight wasn’t something she needed to worry about. I didn’t know how to handle the situation and then I regretted even answering her question… My mom also made her weight an excuse as to why she couldn’t do stuff. I remember being small and asking her to race me and she would say things like, “I’m to fat to run.” We also went hiking and rock climbing with the girl scouts once and I begged my mom to come with me and she said she couldn’t because she was fat. I don’t know that stuff has always stuck with me. Again I don’t blame her or resent her for the things she said it just makes me very body conscious. I’m working on loving the way I look and being proud of the things my body has done.
• I don’t see my body as something post baby. Actually the parts of me that are post baby like boobs and stretch marks and even the tearing didn’t phase me. It’s the parts that I’m responsible for damaging that’s hard. But I’m trying to find a self acceptance place. Not meaning I won’t love me till I’m skinny. I’m just trying to love any shape I’m I’m because that’s how God has me shaped right now.

Here is was my input:

I mourn my skin. A good portion of my skin is covered in this. I know I can gain and lose weight but the thought of this never going away makes me sad.I have to remind myself as well that the baby was worth it but I’m still mourning.

I’ve done a lot of reflecting for this post… and over this past year. My initial reaction to my thoughts are to shame myself for even caring about how I look. Like, ohhhh Ann, it doesn’t matter. Don’t be conceited. It’s just skin. It’s just weight. None of those things define you.

You’re right. They don’t. I need to drop the shame though and instead I need a gentle reminder to acknowledge but don’t dwell. 

There is sadness because the skin I was in for 24 years is now very different but I can’t dwell on it. I can’t harp on it every single day. Mentally beating myself down. Acknowledge it, then move on. Here’s the thing though, you might have to do this several times a day.

Now this is often easier said than done, especially when everywhere you look has picture of what people idolize as the “perfect” body. It all comes back to the standard of beauty and where you find your worth. Are you defined by what the world says you should be/look like or do you find yourself in who God has said you are and called you to be?

My favorite verse (that’s at the top of the page) has been with me since high school and it reminds me of what is important when the world is screaming at you that you need to weigh x amount, have a cellulite-less body and fit into size x jean. Your boobs can’t sag, your butt needs to be perky, your face acne-less, your nose completely different.  The list is endless.

What’s precious to God though? A gentle and quiet spirit. The woman who sits at his feet. The woman who loves without reserve on her family and her community. The woman who see’s her worth not from the outside but instead, the inside. I’m preaching to myself. I still struggle with recognizing the internal worth and offering myself grace. I’m really really hard on myself. I don’t say that for sympathy, I just say it to let you know that we all have our struggles and I struggle with offering myself grace when I feel like I’ve failed. It can be a vicious internal cycle. Shoot – this blog post just got reallll. 😉 Trying to lighten the mood.

This is such a raw and revealing post for me. I don’t want to come across as “all I care about is my looks” but instead, I want there to be a sense of comradery. We have all dealt with this in some way or another. Some days it’s hard to process and deal with it all. Worthy of a blog post? I thought so. Or maybe you’re all just rolling your eyes at me? All 200+ of you who read. (Talk about intimidating).

There is no real end to this blog post. No tidy perfect ending. This journey is continuous. It’s a daily point to accept this new mom bod I have and to know that I’ll go through the same 2 year journey again (one day). It’s hard. Is it worth it? Absolutely. Do I need daily reminders to love myself because there is so much more than the outside shell? Yes.

So, if you have a new mom bod or a not so new mom bod but you’re struggling, let’s really work on giving ourselves more grace. Focus on seeing your worth because of the mighty God that dwells in you instead of the outside shell that faces the seasons as they change. Your beauty is internal. You’re not defined by the shell. No matter the shape, weight or condition of the exterior, it doesn’t change your worth or how much God adores you.

Compliment a friend today. I’m sure they need to hear it.