Author: Bonnie (SOAM)

My Miracle Baby (Anonymous)

Bonnie (SOAM) Belly, Child Loss, Complications in Pregnancy, NICU, Preemie, Pregnant, Second Pregnancy, Submissions 3 Comments

I started college in the fall of 2007 where I met my wonderful fiance and my life was going really great. I started dating him in August of 2007 and became pregnant in September. I panicked and sought out to my roommates to figure out what to do. One of them suggested to take vitamin c every hour because it supposedly caused a woman to miscarry. I was so very desperate and so unprepared that I decided to do it. I ended up losing the baby and I never told anyone else besides those girls about that experience. I was devastated, but quickly got back to doing well in school and trying my best to abstain from sex. I was hurting so much inside that it made me physically ill thinking about what I had done. I didn’t understand why on earth I would do something like that to an innocent being. It proved to be one of the many challenges that semester. I ended up getting mono, and my boyfriend broke up with me which was more than I could handle. About two weeks later, we got back together and everything seemed fine. Our relationship had a pretty rocky start and by february 2008, I was pregnant again. I was thinking of the horrible decision I had made before and I promised myself not to ever do something like that again. I decided to keep my baby and my fiance stood by my side every step of the way. It was not easy, but I was determined to get through it. I had a huge support system from my family, my fiance, and my fiance’s family. I was 140lbs when I got pregnant and the day before I had my daughter I was 187. I had never weighed that much in my entire life. I missed being 140lbs because that was the time when I felt amazing about myself! I want that back so badly!

I was due November 14, 2008 with my daughter, but had her October 9th due to complications with toxemia. My b/p was 160/110 and the protein level of my urine reached 7,000 from 1,200 three days prior. I couldn’t believe it! I was 34weeks 6days when she was born. She weighed 4lbs 13ounces and was 18in long. She was in the NICU for 13 days before I got to bring her home. It was the hardest thing I ever had to go through. I spent every day in the hospital with her and held her for as long as I could. I didn’t even get to see her until 2 days postpartum. I cried when I was discharged and I could not bring my little baby home with me.

I think back to my miscarriage and while I feel the deepest regret for what I had done, I can’t help but feel thankful too that if I had gone through with the first pregnancy, then I would not have my beautiful baby girl.

She is now a healthy 2 month old. She is the most amazing person in the world and I love her so much.

Funny story about her name…I LOVE Jon and Kate Plus 8, and I was so drugged up(heavy meds after a c-section lol!!) when the birth recorder came by to get her name that I named my daughter after 2 of Jon and Kate Gosselin’s kids…Madelyn Alexis Faith.

Hahaha.
Oops!
Well, Madelyn was picked out waaay before I saw the show so that is okay :)

I do not have any belly pictures on this computer, but I do have some pre-pregnancy pictures, hospital pictures, and some pictures of Madelyn!




5 Weeks Postpartum with First Pregnancy (Anonymous)

Bonnie (SOAM) Belly, Breasts, Butt, First Pregnancy, Postpartum, Submissions 5 Comments

On Nov 6, 2008, I was blessed with a beautiful daughter. She is amazing to me because it is the first person in my life I can look at and see some resemblance of myself. I was adopted as a newborn, and always stuck out like a sore thumb with my light brown hair, blue eyes, and tall stature. It has always been very important to me have a child of my own. My daughter is the most precious gift I have ever received, and even on my worst days, she is the light that brightens my day. At 5 weeks pp, I am watching the changes in my body take place slowly. I gained 45 pounds during my pregnancy. I have lost 28 of it thus far. At 5’10”, I was a 165 pounds (a size 8), with an athletic body. Now I am good size 12, with 38E chest, and sagging belly. Sometimes it is difficult for me to understand how my husband can still find me sexually attractive. Clothed, I am for the most part comfortable with myself. I can cover the layers of skin & fat with a shirt & pants. Naked, I cringe if I look in the mirror. All I see is my sagging breasts, stretch marks, wider hips, and baby belly. As much I disagree with him that I am still beautiful, his words mean more to me than I can express. I know that beauty comes from within, and the confidence of finding yourself beautiful outweighs any outwardly appearance. I must to learn to love my stretch marks, bigger curves, and pudgy belly. I am slowly coming to terms that my body may never be the same as before, and now I am beautiful in a new type of way: a motherly way.






Not Shy Anymore! (Anonymous)

Bonnie (SOAM) Belly, Cesarean (Vertical), Cesarean Scar and/or Incision, First Pregnancy, Postpartum, Pregnant, Submissions 21 Comments

I was always aware that my body was attractive and that I was able to get mens attention, but I was uncomfortable with it….. After giving birth, my body is very different (as you can see) and not as nice as before, but so many people saw me naked (including many men) that I am over any shyness and now enjoy my attractiveness!


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3 weeks PP after having a 8lb 15oz baby boy (Anonymous)

Bonnie (SOAM) Belly, First Pregnancy, Postpartum, Pregnant, Submissions 4 Comments

I am 20 years old and I am married to a wonderful man who is serving our country with the army for the last 3 years. This is our first child and he is just a blessing. Thru out my pregnancy it was hard for me to gain weight. Before I was pregnant I weight 159lbs. I gained a total of 22lbs during pregnancy. But the majority of that was at the last two months of my pregnancy. I am the type of person who worries about looks and it was hard for me to except how my body was changing. With the stretch marks, the weight gain, etc…I have now excepted it, and when I do completely heal up, I plan to exercise and eat right so that it will continue to look better. And also what helps alot is that my wonderful husband is very supportive…And still finds me attractive after all this…but this was all worth it for my little man!!!




Update (Berni)

Bonnie (SOAM) Belly, First Pregnancy, Piercing, Postpartum, Submissions, Tattoo, Teen Mom, Update 13 Comments

Original entry here.

My son is now 6 and a half months old and feel worse the ever about my body. I love my son so much and feel so guilty for hating my body as it carried him for for 40+11 weeks. My body created a beautiful 10 lb 10oz baby boy but I can’t accept it. I feel like at 19 years old my body is ruined. The worst thing is I know I’m being stupid but I can’t help it. I don’t understand how over women do it.






Updated here and here.

The body I once hated (Anonymous)

Bonnie (SOAM) Belly, First Pregnancy, Pregnant, Submissions 3 Comments

When I was pregnant with my son, I hated my body. I hated the clothes I had to wear, I hated looking in the mirror, I hated being naked. My husband was always very loving, but I had always believed that beautiful was skinny. Beautiful was not a pregnant woman. The evening before my son, Tristan, was born my husband begged me to take one photograph. I, after much some complaining, agreed. I thought it was awful. The next evening I had my son, he was perfect. A few months later I came across the picture taken the evening before he was born. Somehow afterwards, it was awful anymore, I came to see it as beautiful. I wished I could share it, but its naked and so exposed. No one could possibly want to see a naked pregnant woman, I was ashamed of it. After a few months, it grew on me. I showed it to some very close friends, they loved it. I had never imagined anyone liking the look of a fat pregnant woman, but they did. Its since grown on me, I love it. My only complaint now is I wish I had taken more. The body I have may not be the body I ever wanted, but the two children it produced are worth so much more then a body, and are worth every single stretch mark and extra pound. I love my mommy body.




Anonymous

Bonnie (SOAM) Adoption, Belly, Postpartum, Second Pregnancy, Submissions 14 Comments

i’ve been visiting this site for nearly two years now and, since the beginning, i’ve wanted to submit my story. i am a 30 year old mother to two sons, aged 3 and 18 months. we are currently expecting our third baby, through international adoption. my husband and i were married in june of 2004, and two months later we found out that we were pregnant with our first child. i was, on my wedding day, *thinner* than i’d ever been since high school, weighing about 135 pounds at 5’7″. very quickly, in pregnancy, (many thanks to emotional eating coupled with milkshakes, and peanut butter m&ms) i gained nearly 80 pounds. somehow, i thought that all of my pregnancy weight would just “melt away.” my lowest weight between baby number 1 and baby number 2 was 152 pounds. now, a year and a half after the birth of our second child, i weigh about 13 more pounds than i did the day we were married, when i was at my *thinnest.* today, i am stronger than ever before. in may, i completed my first half marathon (something i NEVER could have done when i weighed 135 pounds.) i’ve run over 500 miles in the past year. i’m currently training for another 13.1 mile race, and i’m working towards a 200 mile, 10 person relay. while i don’t absolutely love the body that i see in the mirror every single day (especially not its stretch marked tummy or “pancake-y” breasts) i stand in awe of what it has accomplished; my body carried two strong, healthy baby boys to 41 weeks and 2 days (each!), it endured two natural childbirths (the first one totaling about 20 hours, with nearly 4 hours of drug free pushing!), it’s nourished and sustained and comforted and carried and protected two amazing little boys who are in love with every single inch of their mama. and, it’s being loved now, by my husband, like it’s thinner self never would have dreamed possible. (my body truly is a wonderland.) as i wait, now, for my third child to come home to us, i realize that there is so much more to the shape of a mother than her outstretched stomach, her rippled thighs, her c-section scar or her wrangled belly button. what’s more important are the marks left, the changes made, inside of her. while i may not be showing, my heart is fully expecting.





Okay during pregnancy, self-conscious now (Karen)

Bonnie (SOAM) Belly, Body Image, First Pregnancy, No Photos (Story Only), Submissions 5 Comments

I was 31 when my son was born. I had spent, easily, 25 years feeling fat, feeling overweight, feeling shy about my shape. As a teenager, I fluctuated between 15-30lbs more than was “recommended” by doctors at the time (5’4″-5’5″ and 130-145lbs). Then I met and married my husband, who is in no way shy about admiring me.

I won’t say this changed my self consciousness. In fact, I gained weight after we married and despite constant reassurance, I felt undesirable and sad about my appearance. I’ve always carried my weight in my stomach, the classic apple-on-toothpicks physique, and it didn’t help that I have a deep, 4-5″ wide appendectomy scar, but if I could shield my tummy with a loose shirt everything else was okay. But now, everything started to look bigger and was definitely not okay.

So this is where I was when we conceived our son. I was so happy to be pregnant! I suffered some morning sickness, the usual aches and pains, and went through a lot of therapy in order to make sure that my personal issues wouldn’t be a psychological hurdle to my long-dreamed of home birth. But really? The best part? I could stop worrying about how fat I was! For years, I’d had the “when are you due? Oh, I’m so sorry, I thought you were pregnant” comments. Well, now I was! I was so happy. I stopped worrying about how much I ate or how much fat I consumed. I had developed a pretty healthy diet over time, so that was not a concern. The excuse to nurture my baby gave me permission to be good to myself and feel good about myself without feeling guilty.

I was disappointed that I felt I didn’t look pregnant for the longest time. My baby belly was hidden under my belly fat. Finally I began to show, and yes, my belly now looks like many pictured here, a round mound of ribbed wobbliness in the middle of a saggy tummy. I weighed 165lbs when I conceived, and (yes, I was deep down glad of this) when I delivered him I weighed 198, and remember being glad I didn’t break 200. Even though I wasn’t watching the scale. Even though all that mattered was my son’s health. Even though I was healthy. Two lousy pounds and I was suddenly a slave to an arbitrary, conventionalized scale system! Sigh. I don’t have too many more stretch marks; most of mine are old, from pre-pregnancy, and present, but silvered by time. I don’t think about them much. I worry more about varicose veins (it’s the curse of the apple-figured, and I’m seeing a few more and more and am more selfconscious in shorts now).

My son is 5. When he turned 2 I began to worry about my weight again. I fight with myself, swinging wildly between anxiety and fear, and self-confidence and calm. One day is good, I feel motherly and earthy and sensuous and full of fun, but a few days later I feel matronly and doughy and dull. I’m afraid the latter is more often the rule, and I hate shopping, though I love clothes. Everything is so tight-fitted and belly-focused!

One thing that has struck me is how arbitrary a lot of this feels. As soon as I’m given permission and a reason that I honor with all my heart (pregnancy) I stop worrying about the “outlines” in which I’m supposed to inhabit and allow myself its organic shape. When my son’s friends’ mothers weaned their children and began to talk about “getting in shape” I became aware again, agitated, and yearned for the peace I felt when the conversations were less about body shape and size and more about what those bodies could do. Suddenly I remembered feeling like the Fat One. It’s hard to shake. But when I cuddle with my husband, or when I hold my son, or nurse him (yes, he’ll be five soon, and it brings him such joy to have that special time with me), I am so glad that whatever I feel, what they see and feel when they are with me brings them happiness. That’s healing, whatever else. But I do wish that I could feel the way I did when I was pregnant, the feeling I imagined that most “normal-sized” women feel all the time (and yes, I realize that even now, at 5”5″ and 165, size 14, I’m overweight but not too far off average)–the feeling of being good right where I was, and not comparing myself to anyone else. It was wonderful.