“Stretching the Truth” seemed a very appropriate title for the article in today’s newspaper! I have heard so many women say that their children ruined their bodies. I know that is not the case with me! I have two beautiful girls. One is over 30 years old and the other just started college. My first pregnancy I ate well and was quite active at my job. I walked alot and only gained 28 pounds. I was also only 22 years old. My body returned to its pre-pregnancy wt. of 125 pounds within a week after delivery. My daughter was a healthy 9 pounds and 4 ounces at birth! During my second pregnancy (at 34 years old) I was not so fortunate. By then I had a more sedentary job and a lot of co-workers who brought in donuts almost daily. I gained 40 pounds of what I called my “donut fat”. After delivery I started eating sensibly again and doing some moderate exercising. It took me almost a year to get back to a healthy weight. I am a nurse who has worked with many eating disordered clients and I believe we should strive for progress not perfection when dealing with weight issues. It is a shame but we do pass down our attitudes about food and weight to our children. Passing on the message that being pregnant causes you to retain “baby fat” forever, or that there is a certain “shape” of mothers is incorrect. As this web site shows, you can have children without ending up obese or even out of shape. It’s too bad that the article seemed too focused on the negative aspects of our bodies afterwards. Not everyone has this experience and although having children does change your body it is NOT their fault! I know my extra pounds came from eating for four instead of two. I have a new diet and it’s simple to follow..eat less and move more! I am in my early fifties now and have never felt better. My kids appreciate that I am healthy and active enough to do things with them. This web site is a wonderful way for women to gain insight into their attitudes and beliefs about what happens to their bodies during pregnancy. P.S. The attached photos were taken today and were not retouched..I have also not had any nipping or tucking done : )
i agree having 2 kids myself i worked out and ate well during my pregnancies, never sat around eating junk or chips…im not even 30 years old yet, as Iam 28. I still look damn good and have super flat belly, no stretchies,and decent boobs, it is possible to look great after a child, i know that some things are genetic, like maybe a belly pooch but you can wear shirts to cover that up. Iam living proof you dont have to end up obese,fat or dumpy after children, all it takes is effort and drive. :)
Leah was brave enough to show how her body has changed because of two pregnancies and here you are saying “its stretching the truth”. Shame on you, we should be proud of women who have the strength to show the bodies they have grown to love because they have nurtured children. The truth is that she does have a condition that causes her to retain water (she herself stated it in the comment section) but other women who might not have a medical condition still have a difficult time losing weight.
Good for you that your body magically returned to PP weight only 1 week after delivery, but I can assure you that if I poll women on this site most did not bounce back 1 week after having a kid, come on! Women come in all shapes and sizes and pregnancy does alter a woman’s body drastically, its not so much that they are lazy or eat chips all day..metabolisms change after pregnancy. I was 110 lbs before I had my child and just like you I eat less and move more than before I had a child and am heavier now. Why? Because my body went through a pregnancy which alters skin elasticity, hormones, bone density, and metabolism among other things..wake up and see that not all mothers bounce back and no its their fault. The website is called The Shape of a Mother because it emphasizes that mothers come in all shapes and sizes and that these brave women who submitted their photos are what real women look like not what we see in airbrushed celebrities.
I want to clarify that this post, IMO, is not taking a shot at Leah, but trying to speak up for the diversity of SOAM women which the poster feels wasn’t adequately represented in the article.
I also want to clarify that there are MANY causes of obesity and they are NOT all due to poor habits. Let’s try to remember not to assume that a person who is overweight must not be working hard enough at losing the weight.
The Shape of a mother does not always have to do with weight, it is also stretch marks, one of my tiny sisters gained 50 lbs and had no stretch marks and is still tiny and another gained the 25 and got stretch marks but she is still tiny too, it does change the shape of breasts from feeding whether bigger, smaller, higher(we wish), lower… and some women have looser skin some do get wider in the hips from carrying the baby low, so it is not just negative things, let us enjoy this site.
There are only 3x in your life where you grow new fat cells
Infancy
Puberty
&&Pregnancy
SO pregnancy CAN cause cellulite.
Even if I had been a good girl and eaten the way I was supposed to and exercised to a T, My stomach still would have stretched to EPIP proportions.
I don’t have the shape of a 21 yr old anymore
I have the shape of a mother
There are many many shapes, but the ones generally associated (extra skin, baby fat, stretchmarks) are the general undercurrent of most
I, too, had a great physical recovery from my son’s delivery. I hadn’t looked at my stomach (c-section and was terrified of seeing it, it felt so awful when I accidentally brushed my hand against the staples) but on check-out day my doctor informed me, ‘You don’t have any tummy at all!’ She was right, it was flatter than Pre-Pregnancy. I joked later that ‘she must have tucked me when she sectioned me’.
‘We should strive for progress and not perfection.’ This is a beautiful sentiment. After my son and I came home and had recovered for a few months, I decided to start tracking how many miles I travelled on my own two feet. This has been so freeing- I have slowly dropped below my prepregnancy weight, but it’s not about that- it’s about something I can proudly proclaim! ‘I’ve walked x-hundred miles this year!’ Rather than a number that goes backwards and forwards, sometimes without us knowing why, I can focus on a number that never goes backwards. Each step I take gives me that much more progress.
I also say that you ate for four ; )
I have also lost all of my pregnancy weight… and am now back to my prepregnancy size and weight. However, pregnancy changes everyone…even those of us who have lost all the weight! its not the exact same body you had before children. Some of us are fortunate, to have the “good genes”, and some of us not. I believe working out and good eating habits are a part of it, but the other part is genes. I have seen some who never had to workout or eat right and lose the weight so quickly, and some who workout a lot and try to eat so little, but have a lot of difficulty losing it. So I don’t think it is right to say that those who did no lose the weight did not put the effort in to try to lose their weight or get back into shape. For myelf, I have been through three pregnancy and had to be consistent with my workouts and tried to eat right to lose the weight. I will say that I have been doing these “barre” type of workouts. That has made me lose the weight the fastest and also got me into the best shape of my life…although the tummy area is still my most difficult part to tone. :)
I also hate reading when a woman says having a baby ‘ruined’ her body. What about women who lose their uterus from childbirth? Or get a flesh eating bacteria from a c-section? I had/have severe arthritis flare ups due to pregnancies, but my body is not ‘ruined’. It’s just a vessel for our souls. And while we should take care of it for health reasons, stretch marks are so petty in the greater scheme of life!
Good for you for taking great care of yourself!