A Year of Gratitude: Day 268

Today I am grateful that we, as a culture, are starting to talk about what post-natal bodies really look like.  (Check here, here, here, and here for further reading.)  I think back to my own experience, going from a glowing, yet very large, lady at 39 weeks ...

... to what, at the time, felt like Jabba the Hut.

I knew my body wouldn't snap back immediately, but I had no idea I would look as I did.  And I felt so bad about it, so uncomfortable.  (Though I imagine at least part of the discomfort was because of the c-section.)  When they told me Baylor weighed 10 lbs. 10 oz., I imagined losing that weight and being close to back to "normal", even though I knew I had gained a total of 64 pounds with him and weighed more than my husband did.  So it was a shock to see my post-baby body and it was awkward seeing others and wondering what they thought, and I hated seeing all those celebrities snap back within weeks, maybe a month, of having a baby, and I wondered what I was doing wrong that I couldn't attain that.  I consider myself to be a relatively smart person, but my whole world had been turned upside down and this was just one more thing that didn't make sense.

That seems like forever ago, these pictures and that feeling of "Jabba-ness", and thankfully all I really remember feeling was this ...

Joy.  So much joy.  In the end, it didn't matter how big I still was, how soft my belly had become.  All that mattered was my little boy and the love that was growing rapidly in our hearts.

(Sadly, postpartum depression set in pretty quickly and wiped away a lot of that joy, but I try to view that time with a grateful heart, so grateful that I have moved past that point onto much happier times.)

So let's get this acceptance going.  Let's let new moms off the hook and allow the love to spread and build like it should.  Forget the judgement and take a pass on the gossip and just ... love.

Have a wonderful night!