Breasts

Hating My Post-Baby Body (Anonymous)

Bonnie (SOAM) Belly, Breasts, Postpartum, Second Pregnancy, Submissions 15 Comments

I was always in great shape. I used to have visible abs, perky boobs, and a pretty shape. I got pregnant at 18 by my high school sweetheart, and had my daughter at 19. I put on 85 lbs with my first pregnancy. I suffered from terrible ppd and for a long time was depressed about how I looked, but didn’t really care. I was in a terrible relationship and hated my life. 2 years later, I was still 40 lbs from my pre weight, up 7 pant sizes, but finally able to start getting my life back. I decided to leave my relationship and get a better start on my life. Unfortunately I found out I was pregnant again. This time on my own, I gained little extra weight, and combined with excessive blood loss due to a difficult delivery, I left the hospital at 30 lbs over my initial prepregnancy weight, down 10 from when I got pregnant. Now, 2 and a half years later, I am 15 lbs from my pre weight. I wear a size 3, but I am still in agony over how I look. Due to the large weight gain in my first, I have strech marks EVERYWHERE and they are terrible. On my thighs, some are 3-4 in long and an inch wide. I have them on my arms, boobs, starting 4 in above my belly button all the way down to the backs of my knees and my calves. I hate my belly, my breasts, everything. I was married 2 years ago, and I have become jelous, possesive, and incredibly loathing of myself and anyone my husband might find more attractive than I. Some days I think its not so bad, but other I want to lie in bed and cry over what has become of my previously great body. I used to be a happy, confidant, independent person, but now I’m shy, insecure, and needy. I hate what I have become, and am hoping things are going to get better.

Age 23
Pregnancies: 2
Ages 4 and 2

Update – 20 months postpartum and I want another baby (Anonymous)

Bonnie (SOAM) Belly, Breasts, Butt, Child Loss, Postpartum, Submissions, Third Pregnancy 13 Comments

Your Age: 22
Number of pregnancies and births: 3 pregnancies, 1 birth
The age of your children, or how far postpartum you are: 20 months pp
Original entry here.

It has been 9 months since my previous post, and some things have happened. At 15 months we stopped breastfeeding. I’m still a little sad, I thought we would breastfeed longer than that but we gave my daughter whole milk after she turned 12 months and by 15 months she just wasn’t interested in me anymore. Once my milk dried up I noticed all of these little tiny white stretch marks surrounding my nipples. I hate them! My right boob has more than my left and they are bigger and deeper too. I think that is because she always preferred my right breast. I’m not happy with the way my boobs turned out at all! But on a positive note I am completely fine with the rest of my body. My tummy still sticks out a tiny bit but that’s okay. I have been running for 2 months now and I can really see a difference in my muscle tone! I also became pregnant shortly after we stopped nursing but at 5 weeks had a miscarriage. I would love to have another baby, I loved being pregnant and breastfeeding, but my husband wants to wait awhile. So right now I’m just trying to enjoy my body while I have it and hope in the next couple years we have another little one on the way!

3 photos of me and 2 of my boobs at 20 months postpartum.

Stretch marks and deflated boobs, but I’m doing great! (Anonymous)

Bonnie (SOAM) Belly, Breasts, Butt, First Pregnancy, Postpartum, Submissions 22 Comments

I am 26 years old and this was my first pregnancy. I am 4 months post partum at the time of these photographs. My prepregnacy weight was 110 and I am now at 119. At full term I was 149. My butt and thighs got so many stretch marks. I still can not get any of my prepregnancy pants past my thighs. They may not ever go back. I feel like my bones have shifted and my hips have widened….but I’m doing okay. I love being a mother and my husband has been so supportive of my new body. The stretch marks on my hips and thighs can be seen when I wear a bathing suit and that makes me self conscious though they are already fading a bit. They were dark purple and angry looking when I got them. I got all of my stretch marks in the very last month of pregnancy…I thought I was doing so good until then. The ones on my boobs are fading too, but breast feeding is sucking the life out of them. I was a 34B…then a 36DD…now I’m down to a 34 C or D…so they are starting to look a little like pancakes. Everytime I start to get down on my self I just think of my little boy and that helps…quite a bit.

~Your Age: 26
~Number of pregnancies and births: 1st
~The age of your children, or how far postpartum you are: 4 months

Wishing to be confident again (Anonymous)

Bonnie (SOAM) Belly, Breasts, Postpartum, Second Pregnancy, Submissions 18 Comments

My age 23. Two children ages 3 and 1

I became pregnant at the age of 19 with my first son. I was scared for about half a second, then thrilled. I was worried about what would happen to my body, I was always very fit. But I knew a lot of girls who had babies and you could not tell by looking at them, so I figured I would be the same way. I ate fairly well through out my pregnancy, but I still gained over 60 lbs! Despite constantly rubbing coco butter all over my belly I was covered in stretch marks, I was devastated. On top of that, due to my weight gain and swelling, my thighs, inner thighs, and calves were also covered. I was going to include pictures but they have faded so much the camera didn’t pick them up. So not only can I not wear a bikini, now I couldn’t even wear shorts either!! At 21 I got pregnant with my second son, I didn’t gain as much weight with him, and didn’t even use any lotions because I already had marks everywhere. And surprisingly I didn’t not get a single new stretchie.
After 3 years I still cry over them, I feel so ugly. I work out daily hoping they will magically “unstretch” but they don’t. My sons’ father and I broke up this Feb and I want to start dating again. But when it comes to sex, well I try to put it off until I just break it off because I am so terrified that I will get dumped over having them. I love my boys more then anything, and they are worth every change to my body. But I still wish it could be different. I want everyone on here to know how much you have helped me start to feel like it’s okay to look this way. Don’t get me wrong, I do feel confident and sexy… when I have clothes on.
Also I have read comments about some girls lie about not having stretch marks, it’s true I am one of them. When people tell me how great I look and ask if I got them, I say no. Because when I say yes I just want to cry.
Anyways, thanks for reading my story. Hope it can make someone feel like they don’t look so bad… honestly some posts on here make me feel like I got pretty lucky because it could be so much worse. If that’s wrong I’m sorry.

22 years old on my second pregnancy I’m at 23 weeks (Lissete)

Bonnie (SOAM) Belly, Breasts, Piercing, Postpartum, Pregnant, Second Pregnancy, Submissions, Teen Mom 8 Comments

Hi im Lissete. I am on my second pregnancy at 23 weeks now , my first child i gained 75 lbs , i have always dealt with poor body image since i grew to a d cup at age 10. i was 17 years old when i had my daughter my pre-pregnancy weight was 127 (im 5’4) and i ended at 202 . i only lost 10 lbs during my postpartum , i was with my daughters father for 3 years afterward and our relationship fell apart due to my weight gain and my body appearance. a year later i met someone for the first time who loved me not my body.

i found out i was pregnant on may 28 and at first was very upset about the thought of gaining more weight, but i have lucked out and in fact lost 15 lbs since i found out. all i care about now is being healthy , eating right and staying fit, weather or not i lose or gain weight doesn’t matter to me anymore, i love my stretch marks they are every where and i don’t care! they are my symbols of love that i have as a mother and woman.

for all you ladies out there who are being put down , plus sized or not YOU ARE beautiful , once you believe this you can truly be free.

10 months PP (Anonymous)

Bonnie (SOAM) Belly, Breasts, First Pregnancy, Postpartum, Pregnant, Submissions 6 Comments

I had a wonderful and fairly easy pregnancy, but a very hard, long delivery. I wanted an all natural, waterbirth at the birthing center with my midwife. My water broke 2:00am Friday morning and contractions started 45 min. later. By 10:am they were 10 min. apart and my midwife wanted me to come to the birthing center. Things progressed pretty quickly from there and then seemed to come to a halt with me having very strong contractions all Friday night, all of Saturday and Sunday. I couldn’t eat anything because I was throwing it up. By midnight on Sunday after several hours (!) of pushing and nothing happening (my midwife said he was turned face up and tried turning him with no luck) my husband finally stepped in and said we needed to go to a hospital. They had to put me on an IV right away because I had no energy after three days of not eating or sleeping. Then my husband and mom made the decision for me to have an epidural which let me sleep for awhile. Finally after three more hours of pushing I had my beautiful little boy Monday at 12:07pm!!!

It was also a long and rough recovery – my hips where thrown out and I could not walk without help for close to two weeks after. I also tore pretty badly. I felt like a failure, here was my little baby who needed me and I couldn’t even carry him around, or change his diaper, or rock him to sleep!! My husband was my rock during that time, he changed diapers (which he had never done before!!), did the laundry, made meals and took care of both me and the baby without complaining. While I did not end up having the delivery that I wanted, I have the most precious thing I could ever imagine and I wouldn’t trade him for anything!!

I started out at 115 before I was pregnant, gained 45 and now am 130. I still have 15 pounds to go to make it back to my pre-pregnancy weight. I always thought I’d lose it all by 9 months PP, so I’m a little discouraged to be 10 months PP and still have this much more to lose, it just seems stuck there!! But, when I see my little one cruising around and getting into everything it doesn’t bother me so much!! :) Also, I thought I was going to come out with no stretch marks, but they showed up just 1-2 weeks before delivery, on my stomach and thighs. Not to bad though, just a few and pretty light. If anyone has any good tummy tightening exercises they would like to share that would be great!! :) Love this site!!!

~ (Age) 27
~ 1 pregnancy – 1 birth
~ Son, 10 months old, 10 months postpartum
~ 1st picture – Me, 8 months Pregnant (yes, I did get bigger!!!). 2nd picture – My baby boy minutes after birth. 3rd picture – Me, 2 days PP. 4th & 5th pictures – Me, 10 months PP.

From size 0 to 5 (Nancy)

Bonnie (SOAM) Before Pregnancy, Belly, Breasts, Cesarean, First Pregnancy, Postpartum, Pregnant, Submissions 11 Comments

Age : 26
Pregnancy : 1
Children : A daughter, Chloé

I learned about this website from a close friend to which I confided my body changes during and after pregnancy. I was relieved to see others with the same problems as me but I figured I’d be back in shape in no time so I didn’t worry too much over it. Here I am, 7 months later, posting my very own story !

I used to be one of those lucky girls who never went on a diet, I could eat whatever I wanted and my weight had been a mere 105 pounds for the last 5 years. I inherited this fantastic body from my mother and she always said to me that for her 2 pregnancies, she put on about 25 pounds and a week after she was back in her old size 25 jeans. I always jokingly told my husband how lucky he was to have a wife that could snap back into shape so we could have lots and lots of kids !

However it went very different for me. I gained 25 pounds in the first 6 months of my pregnancy, which was pretty standard. At 7 months I was put on bed rest and stopped working because I had strong contractions every day and was in and out of the hospital a few times. I ended up gaining another 40 pounds in only 3 months. So me, that was used to be 105 pounds, I was now carrying 165 pounds. On top of that I had oedema so bad you couldn’t even see my ankles. My baby finally arrived at 42 weeks after me being inducted ans a c-section (the irony !!!).

Now I’ve been trying to cope with the aftermath and I feel like my body went trough a war. All I can say is that I now understand what it feels like to be insecure, to suck a tummy in public and dress in medium or large. It takes strong women to be confident in any shape or size, for those out there, I applaud you. You know, I don’t want to sound like I complaint because I know that some women would love to be my actual size, but I think the point for a lot of women is the gap between how were before and how hey are now. For me the road to being confident in my new size has just started.

Pre-pregnancy weight : 105 lbs – size 0
End-of pregnancy weight : 165 lbs
7 months post-pregnancy weight : 130 lbs – size 5

Missing my darling daughter, 15.5 weeks postpartum (Jillyn)

Bonnie (SOAM) Before Pregnancy, Belly, Breasts, Breech Baby, Child Loss, Complications in Pregnancy, First Pregnancy, Postpartum, Pregnant, Submissions, Update 35 Comments

I have been meaning to take pictures and post on here for quite a while now, but with so much going on, i just haven’t found the inner strength or time.

When i was 20 weeks pregnant with our first child we had our first ultrasound and they found that i didn’t have any amniotic fluid. So a week later i finally had another ultrasound and the specialist fount that our baby had cysts in both their kidneys. He then told us our baby would not live. My husband and i were both devastated, but we decided to continue with the pregnancy and cherish every moment we had left with our child.

When i was about 28.5 weeks pregnant i ended up going to the ER for sever pain in my back. It turned out my kidney was inflamed and my growing uterus was causing it. They told me the only way to solve the problem would be to have our baby. The next day was my husbands college graduation and 2 days after that we were moving so we didn’t induce right away. After we were moved we set up an induction date for 2 weeks later because our 2 year wedding anniversary was going to be a week after we had moved.

They started the induction May 25th 2009 at 8pm when i was 32 weeks pregnant. On May 27th, 2009 at 5:17pm we gave birth to our daughter, Grace Carpi. She was so tiny, so perfect and angelic. The had been a frank breech so her little bum was all bruised, but other than that, she was just amazing. She weighed 2 lbs 14 oz and was 16 inches long. After she was born she tried to take a breath, she tried 6-8 times in the 10 minutes after she was born. But sadly, her lungs were not developed at all, so 10-15 minutes after she was born, she slipped away from us. She never let out a cry, never opened her eyes. The doctor has tried to tell us that she was a stillbirth, but after talking to other professionals and reading medical journals, we feel that our daughter indeed was alive and we will continue to fight for our right of a birth certificate.

I am 5’5″ and was 178 lbs before i was pregnant. I weighed 210-215 at the end of my pregnancy and now, 15.5 weeks postpartum i weigh 204-207 lbs. Because of my depression i feel it will take me a while go get down to my pre-pregnancy weight and even longer to get to my healthy weight (about 130-140 lbs). I got my first stretch mark at either 7w or 11w (i can’t remember) on my inner thigh. I got the ones on my stomach when i was 25 weeks pregnant. I also got more stretch marks on my hips and on my breasts. I went up a cup size during pregnancy, from a B to a C.

The last 15 and 1/2 weeks have been quite an emotional time for my husband and i. Not only did he just graduate from college, we moved, had our wedding adversary, gave birth to our daughter, buried our daughter, had my 22nd birthday, my husband left for orientation for a new job, we had a memorial for our daughter, went to talk to a panel of people at the hospital about receiving a birth certificate, and my husband left for 4 weeks of training for work. And during all of that we were and are still grieving the loss of our little girl. Some say we shouldn’t be a sad because we knew that she was going to die, but that doesn’t matter to us. We still lost our daughter, she still is not with us and we will miss her forever.

I am posting pictures of me before my pregnancy, at 28w 3d, at 32w (with Henna Tattoo from blessing way), pictures of Grace, and then pictures of me 15.5w postpartum and a picture of my first and worst stretch mark on my leg.

Updated here.

Finally Learning to Love Me (Anonymous)

Bonnie (SOAM) Belly, Breasts, Eating Disorder, First Pregnancy, Postpartum, Submissions, Update 14 Comments

I am 20 years old and gave birth to my beautiful daughter on August 9th, 2009. I loved being pregnant but was so afraid of how I would feel about my postpartum body…in the past I have suffered from body image issues and bulimia which I was slowly recovering from when I discovered that I was pregnant. My biggest fear was that I would look and feel worse than ever about myself after the baby and go back to my old harmful ways of binging, purging and abusing laxatives to try to lose weight.

But the most AMAZING thing has happened: by experiencing the astounding process of growing my daughter inside my body, and then giving birth to her and seeing this PERFECT little creature that I made!- I find myself feeling so much respect and awe for my womanly body and all that it is capable of. Something I have never felt before….I feel Beautiful and Strong and I’m (mostly) okay with the fact that I don’t look perfect. I am capable of being gentle with myself for the first time.

Instead of constantly putting myself down and thinking I’m ugly and I should eat less and try harder and I’ll never be good enough, etc., etc……I am surprised now when I find myself thinking “Good job, you’re doing fine. Take it easy.”….

I HATED myself at 115 lbs, thought I was fat and ugly and no one could ever love me, and now at 142 I’ve never felt so beautiful, happy and worthy of love in my whole life. My body that I loathed so much has made my wonderful daughter for me and I will never intentionally hurt it again.

Just wanted to share :)

These pictures are of me 1 month PP.

Updated here.

Plus-Sized, Proud and a mommy to a monkey! (Monkey’s Mommy)

Bonnie (SOAM) Belly, Breasts, First Pregnancy, Plus-Sized Mom, Submissions, Thyroid Issues 31 Comments

Let me start of by saying I am very proud of who I am. I don’t let the numbers on the scale dictate my happiness. With that being said, here is my story. I am 24 years old and i am a plus sized mommy. I have been plus size since 4th grade and so I really don’t know or remember life any other way.
I got pregnant May of 2008 at 308lbs. I had recently become engaged to my now husband and we had planned a July 2009 wedding. Little did we know we would become pregnant and push up our wedding to September 2008. Our child wasn’t planned, but was 100% wanted. Since we weren’t planning this pregnancy, we were unsure of when she was conceived. We ended up having a Due Date Scan to find out that our child was due January 27th, 2009.
I was over joyed with the fact that I had this life growing inside me. I couldn’t wait for the 1st kicks and I counted down the months until we knew the sex (a girl that we found out 3 days before our wedding, and kept it a secret until our wedding reception where I announced it to all our family and friends). I had a normal pregnancy. No Gestational Diabetes, and only a high blood pressure issue from 36 to 38 weeks that corrected itself. My due date came and went. I stayed at 1cm until I was induced.
My induction went very smoothly and my daughter entered the world on February 4th, 2009 at 8:10 pm via a vaginal, medicated birth. She weighed in at 8lbs 9.4 oz and scored a 9 out of 10 on both her apgar scores. I ended up weighing 326lbs right before delivery. Once home I weighed myself and I was down to 311lbs.
At 4 months postpartum I was diagnosed with PPT (Postpartum Thyroiditis) I have to now take medication for my thyroid. Other than that, I have had no issues with myself. My current weight is 290lbs and I am 7 months PP. I have been working on trying to be healthier, not so much with weight on my mind. I am happy with my body, my husband has never know, seen me any other way and he loves all my curves.
For all the women out there who feel like they would be happier a size or three smaller I say, be proud of who you are, not what your BMI is or your weight is. Love you for you!

~Your Age: I am 24 years old
~Number of pregnancies and births: 1 pregnancy resulting in 1 birth

~The age of your children, or how far postpartum you are: Mya, my daughter is 7 months old and i am 7 months PP