Trenton sent me this link today and I thought I’d pass it along. While we’re on the subject, has anyone seen the Celebrity Baby Blog’s Breastfeeding Gallery up for World Breastfeeding Week?
And I wanted to say, that I am hoping to add a blog for women who are not necessarily mothers soon. :)
The other day I was in the line at the grocery store and there was a man in front of me – very fit, muscular arms – wearing a tank top. I saw that he had stretch marks on his arms. Now I don’t know, perhaps at one time he had gained a lot of weight quickly – or maybe this is a normal thing when lifting weights – but he certainly wasn’t “lazy” about his physique as commentors in the past have hinted about us mothers. It just struck me as interesting.
I also wanted to say that the number of submissions have dropped in the last week or so, and I suspect that it’s because of the diversity of bodies represented here. I imagine a lot of women look and think their body is nothing new. I just wanted to say, please don’t feel you can’t join in just because you’ve found your belly twin! (Reminds me of Joey and his hand twin!) I think part of the beauty of this site is in the stories told along with the photos, and those are never exactly alike.
In site news, we almost have the new submission form ready to use and you can now access this site from the new domain name www.theshapeofamother.com which will currently redirect you here. Working on getting the site transferred totally. I’ve got a few things up in the Cafe Press store so check that out and let me know what other ideas you have (I’d love to find some ideas for shirts for dad’s). I’ll be adding to it and tewakingthe look of it as the week goes on, but at least it’s there – I’m so excited to be getting some stuff from there, I’ve never been this excited about a t-shirt before. Hee!
Have a lovely week, ladies!
LOVE this! Thanks to Scott for the link!
Bonnie, I think it’s so wonderful what you’re doing on your Shape of a Mother website. I wish you enormous success with it – I’m telling my friends to go see it. My single MALE friends.
I’ve looked at all the photos on this website. I think I fall somewhere in the middle as far as the “bounce-back” goes, a couple of the photos made me pout with envy but mostly I just felt an amazing kinship with all the other bared bellies. I barely remember what my stomach looked like before I had kids. I saw a “belly shot” of myself at five months pregnant with OldestKid, and I laughed my butt off. My stomach was flatter in that picture than it is today, almost twenty-three months after YoungestKid was born. No stretch marks yet, either. It made me whimper just a little.
I don’t mind the belly itself so much. The stretchmarks – I don’t even think about them anymore. I got them on my stomach, my breasts, my thighs. They aren’t that bad, they’re basically flesh toned, and at this point they just happen to be a part of me, like my brown eyes or my short fingers or my fantastic legs. The love-handles (love handles, for pete’s sake!), the skin- sag, the pretty much completely horrifying scrotal-foldover when I bend down … those make me feel indignant. They are not supposed to be there! I mean, maybe they’re supposed to be there, but probably just for other women and NOT me – the fact that I have them was obviously a total oversight on nature’s part. I still have my linnea negra, too, at twenty-three months post-partum, but I just think that’s cute. What’s the deal with my belly button changing shape, though? That’s not cute or hateful, it’s just weird. One thing I do love about my post-partum body is my newly aquired butt – it’s not a lot, but it’s more than I used to have and hey! It doesn’t hurt to sit down anymore.
All that stuff can pretty much be covered up by a properly fitting pair of pants and a shirt that’s an appropriate length. Not such a big deal – except the part where I’m a single mom now and have been in a couple of relationships by this point. The first time I was naked in front of a man besides my ex-husband, I actually apologized. For my own body. I shook, I blushed, I said, “I’m sorry… I had kids.” He was beautiful, he said, “Don’t you ever act ashamed in front of me. You have nothing to be ashamed of.” He kissed my belly. He kissed my stretch marks. A funny thing happened when I found a man who really cared about me, who insisted I was beautiful and insisted I believe it too – I became pretty comfortably with my body. Believe me, indignant is a good step up from out-and-out loathing. I find it ironic that I was always so ashamed of my postpartum body in front of my husband, who knew and loved my body before and after I bore his children, and now I don’t think twice about wearing a bikini. An actual bikini! In front of people!
I remember a few years ago when a truly beautiful friend of yours and mine got her belly button pierced, after having two kids, and I was horrified at the very thought of lifting my shirt and showing a complete stranger my belly in all it’s striped, saggy glory. “I would NEVER be able to do that,” I gasped. I’d had it done when I was sixteen, but that was when my tummy was CUTE. Three months ago, with three of my (single, male) friends looking on, I lifted my shirt and got my navel re-pierced by a (single, male, utterly edible) total stranger. It hurt for a split-second, but what I felt more than the pain was a sense of vindication. I won’t find my body shameful anymore.
Keep up the good work, Bonnie. I am so proud of you – of all of us – of mothers. Here’s me NOT sucking in (I usually do, though, in the spirit of complete honesty).
(My ethnic pride belly button ring, haha.)
I had my first child 6 years ago next week, the pregnancy, labour and baby days were all text book and perfect, I felt like the luckiest woman alive. Before getting pregnant I was a fairly standard UK size 12 – 14, larger hips than bust but a reasonably flat stomach and shapely waist. When pregnant I was HUGE. From around 6 months people would ask me how many days I had left. I didn’t put much weight on anywhere other than my stomach, it looked as though I’d shoved a beachball up my top! I wish I had a digitial pic of that but I don’t. Brooke was born on August 10th 2000, 2 weeks early, and weighed in at 7 pounds 11.
After this, my body never quite recovered. I didn’t think too much about it but I hated my stretchmarks with a passion and although I longed for my flat stomach back I didn’t really do much about it. Over the next couple of years I got back to pretty much my pre pregnancy dress size and weight although I never got rid of my stomach. My stretchmarks gradually faded with time and it was only when I was pregnant with my 2nd child 3.5 years later that they came back with a vengeance. Suddenly they looked red and angry again and I remembered how much I disliked them.
The 2nd pregnancy and labour were as perfect as the first except this time around I got bigger much much quicker. By 5 months I looked as though I was about to drop at any time and this is how I looked at 35 weeks, yes I got bigger than that. I was gigantic!
Cameron was born on his due date, 11th august 2004, and the 2nd time around I knew that if I was going to stand any chance of losing the weight and the stomach that I would have to make an effort. Typically I didn’t make any kind of effort, no gym or diet and 2 years later this is how my stomach looks.
Its not great but it doesn’t look as bad here as I think it does. I’m shocked at how much my stretchmarks have faded and although in my head they are still ugly great angry marks they really don’t look that bad here. The side view is a little worse, I really need to lose that pot belly but that is all down to being a little lazy and just not bothered enough about it to do anything.
I have loved reading the stories of everyone here and seeing everyone’s photos. In my experience other women can be so mean about the way they expect you to look, men are a lot more accepting of a changed figure after childbirth. I think its brilliant to read the support and kindness here shown from women to other women, makes me feel all warm in side.
I’m thrilled about this article from London’s Guardian newspaper. Thanks so much to Joanna Moorhead, you did a great job!
hands
Originally uploaded by faerieface.
Browsing our Flickr Group, I came across this photo and wanted to share. It’s my new favorite!
If you haven’t yet seen the discussion over there titled “Fun Stuff” check it out, and let me know what you think!
This is a beautiful site, and I am so glad to have found it. I have been wrestling lately with the state of my body, but until I read some of these posts, I didn’t realize how much…
I seem only to know people who came through pregnancy with no stretch marks, no funky tissue-paper skin, and no extra weight.
I had a dreamy, picture-perfect pregnancy. I worked up until the week before our twins were born (by c-section after 24 hours of labour) in April of 2004. I gained exactly 50 lbs during pregnancy, and lost 60 when they were born.
After our babes were born, I noticed that the muscles in my stomach had separated down the middle, so I had a 2″ gap (that the extra skin would sag into when I lay down– wish I had a picture of that!!!) to go with the big pouch of skin that sill held the shape of two babies.
Since then, I have gained 25 lbs, mostly due to the amount of time I spend playing on the floor and reading book after book after book…or the fact that I generally forget to eat until 8 pm, when the kids go to sleep.
At any rate, these added roles of flesh are just not comfortable. While I don’t really notice the saggy belly, and the “mommy-body” doesn’t even register when I am home with my kids (except when my son sinks his chubby fingers into my bellyskin and giggles), I am not comfortable wearing anything other than stretchpants and loose shirts. I don’t recognize this body in work clothes or dress clothes, or in any capacity when I catch sight of myself in a store window or mirror. And there are moments when just that sight of myself makes me sad and uncomfortable, or feel that somehow I am less worthy of love than my skinny-mother-counterparts. And then there are those moments after when I kick myself, and thank the powers that be for the blessing that is my life.
This is just one more part of the journey– I want to enjoy it!
I came across this website nearly a week ago and I must say, I am very proud of you that you not only focus on one body type after pregnancy. So many times I go to webpages and find that it is only focused at women who compleatly bounce back after pregnancy, or the complete opposite. Sites which feature only overweight women. I am glad you find it necessary to spotlight both. Now, I found out I was pregnant May 7th, 2005. I didn’t know weather to be excited or scared to death. See, I was married the day before. When I told my husband, he was excited. So I let myself get that way too. When I was ten weeks, I began to bleed, and went to the emergency room. I was told the baby was fine. I continued to bleed until 18 weeks along. Then, for no reason: it stopped. I had a very rough pregnancy to start with. Bleeding, severe morning sickness that resulted in losing a large amount of weight. I had to be hospitalized and pumped full of fluids via IV. I also had reoccuring kindney infections. I was put in the hospital at 28 weeks because of my kindneys, they were causing me to go into preterm labor. It was very scary for my husband and I. We didn’t want to loose or little girl. I went into labor on Dec.31, 2005. I was in labor nearly 21 hours when the doctors decided I wasn’t progressing, I was only 4cm dialated, so we proceeded with a csection. I remember hearing my little girl cry out. I was estatic! Mackenzie Grace-Louann was born weighing 8lbs 8.2oz and 20.25″ long. Not long after my delivery, I began having horrible pains in my upper abdomen, off again to emergency room. Come to find out, it is my gallbladder. On May 2nd of 2006, I had to have it removed. Now not only did i have stretch marks and wrinkely skin but a csection scar and now three more from this surgery. I was very small prepregnancy, weighing around 115lbs, I gained thirty pounds during my pregnancy. I have suffered my entire life with eating disorders, but kept it under control and got help during my pregnancy so this weight was very hard for me to handle. I am glad to say I have lost all of my baby weight and my little girl is nearly 7 months old. I did it right, not the old ways I use to do. I am still sad that I have my stretch marks and saggy skin, I wish that I could be like some of the women on here who are proud of them. I wish I had that self esteem. I am envious of those who can accept their bodies, as I cannot. Believe me, I am so greatful for my little girl and would do it all over again times ten. Thank you for this webpage. It is truly inspiring.
My legs are in better shape than they’ve ever been thanks to months and months – nearly a year – of bouncing my daughter to sleep on a birth ball, but note the stretch marks. They made their appearance while I was on bedrest during my pregnancy. Stretch marks and pregnancy pretty much go hand in hand, and I expected to get them on my belly, my hips, perhaps even my breasts… (and I did!) but my calf?! It just wasn’t fair. My breasts and belly and hips stay pretty much covered up, but having my calf stretch marked – and not both calves, oh no, couldn’t be symmetrical about it or anything, just my right calf – was a real bummer. No more shorts or skirts, I would moan.
I want to embrace them. I want to see them as battle scars, or badges of merit, but I’m not having much luck with it yet. I was twenty when I got pregnant and I’m still morning the loss of my young, slender body. My belly is still pretty soggy and stretchmarked, resembling bread dough, but it doesn’t bother me nearly as much as my leg.
Here is the aforementioned calf:
And I’d also like to share a picture I love, of my belly taken at twenty weeks, on my honeymoon in Cozumel: