Of pregnancy, stretchmarks, and motherhood

This post has been brewing in my mind for a while now. We'll see if I can formulate my thoughts as well here as I did in my head while plugging away on the treadmill this morning (dreadmill, to those of you on my friends list )

It seems I see at least one thread every day, sometime several, posted by a new mother. She's 2, 3, or even 6 weeks post-partum and anxious to 'get her old body back,' fit into those pre-pregnancy jeans, and hopefully erase the toll growing a new person took on her body as soon as humanly possible (or faster).

I was that woman (I started to say girl, as 21 seems younger and younger the older I get). I remember looking in the mirror after the most grueling 37 weeks of my life (delivered early due to pre-eclampsia) and not recognizing the person in the mirror. She was a mess of raging red stretchmarks, sagging stomach, hormonal acne, and bags large enough to pack for the weekend under her eyes. I couldn't accept that this was my new reality. I felt ruined. Devastated.

I wish I could sit that girl down on the couch, hug her, and talk to her - really make her listen (she wasn't very good at listening back then, and is probably only moderately better now). Let her know that she's just embarked on a lifelong journey that will be filled with more love, joy, and fear than she could have ever imagined. That the marks that start above her bellybutton and terminate somewhere on her thighs, bisected by the c-section scar that likely saved her from dying in childbirth, aren't the end of the world. No, they'll never go away, but they'll fade. They'll become a permanent reminder of one of the first, but far from last, sacrifices she made for her children. That she deserves to be kind to herself. That it's ok to mourn the loss of that perfectly smooth, flat tummy of her youth, but that someday it really won't matter as much as it seems to right now.

New mommas, love yourselves. Snuggle those babies, sleep when they sleep and cry when they cry if you need to (you'll need to, sometimes). Eat well and healthily (I know some days you'll feel like cold mac and cheese is all you can manage, but try to throw an apple in there too, just so you can feel slightly righteous). Exercise to keep your body healthy and strong. Lift heavy, plank, run marathons, whatever floats your boat, but don't sweat the things that you can't change. Someday soon, your sons will be bigger than you, your daughter's attitude will remind you of a certain teenager you used to see in the mirror, and you'll have been living in that 'new' old body for more years than you can believe have passed. And it will all be worth it.