I am a 24 year old mother of 2, with a third on the way. By the time I meet my daughter, I will be 25. It’s been a short 5 years by many means of measurement, but make no mistake, those 5 years have encompassed more than their fair share. With my first two pregnancies, my husband and I had repeated visits to high-risk centers. Both our baby boys had fetal heart defects and on more than one occassion, our midwife could not detect a heart tone, even with Doppler. Both pregnancies were fraught with worry, but we managed to remain in the birth center the first time, and risked out the second time due to complications on my end. After multiple hospitalizations both for babies and myself, I felt that I had absolutely no right to complain about the shape my body arrived in after birth. I gained more weight than I should have, and my horrible stretch marks were the high price of that weight. It wasn’t until June of this year that I was diagnosed with a disease that caused most, if not all, of my previous, as well as our babies’ previous problems. After that, we decided to try for a third after all. Part of me dreaded it: great, another chance to become even more broken down and worn in. Here’s another sparkling opportunity for my body to become irrepairably damaged! Woo-hoo!
I quickly got over it when I first saw that little jelly bean on the black and white screen… Sort of. I was at least able to bury it deep in myself again… And now, here I am, 22 weeks into this pregnancy, and having a very, very hard time with my post-baby body image. While I’ve never been terribly positive about my body, after my boys were born, it was atrocious. I finally got the nerve to post my thoughts on my blog, here.
My only resolution for 2009 is to post a real entry to this site; I WILL post an entry complete with before and after pictures. If I can draw some strength and reassurance from all the brave and beautiful women I have seen here, I hope to be able to do that for at least ONE other woman… Even if the mere sight of me traumatizes ten other. :-P
I WILL POST IN 2009!!!
