Mamas: What Makes You Feel Pretty?

Not a mom...or even a woman...but I'm so sorry you feel this way. I'm sure you're your own worst critic and what everyone else sees is a beautiful woman! I wish there was more I could say to help.

I am also not a mom, but I suffered through post breast cancer depression. Obviously it is a very different thing, but it also changes your relationship with your body, including your breasts (obviously!), your looks and your aging overall, your family and how they view you, as well as how much sympathy or help I feel I can ask people for on anything these days given how much I feel people did for me when I was at my lowest.

I found that I needed to concentrate more on finding strength and beauty (whatever that means for you personally) from myself and other resources that made me feel “more myself”, and not looking to my husband for validation. He has been with me through thick and thin and also needs a break and to focus on himself. Your husband may also need to focus on what it means to him to be a new dad and take on new responsibilities. I don’t know how easy or difficult it is for men to talk about the feelings they experience around new parenthood, but I can imagine that there may be some similar simply anxiety based feelings about economic challenges for you both, the added responsibilities for you both, the added impact on your personal dynamic, the realization that you both are entering a new phase of adulthood, perhaps he also feels like he is suddenly older? Maybe he also feels less attractive? Who knows? I know my husband had a lot of trouble speaking about the fear and anxiety he felt around my cancer and what it would mean for us as a couple, for us financially, for my long term health, for our long term financial stability, for our goals as a couple, and that still persists and probably will never go away,

American culture somehow makes us feel like our partners need to be everything in our lives - our best friends, our romantic partners, our intellectual equals, our spiritual mirrors, the one and only in all things. I don’t think that societies have put that sort of pressure on marriages from time immemorial. People have had other support systems and other places to draw positive feelings about their value and worth outside of just one relationship.

So my advice would be to remember all of the other people and relationships and experiences you draw meaning from. Do things that have made you the interesting person you are (aside from just physical beauty, which changes over time, but is worn differently and well by women who can stand tall with that grey eyebrow or lopsided or no breasts because they have so much going on for them that people don’t notice it).

Admittedly this has been more challenging during a world wide pandemic, but we now have many tools at our disposal in most Western countries to manage our risk responsibly and to figure out how to engage with the world again a bit more even if we haven’t been. I won’t presume to discuss what that means or should mean for anyone since that is such a complicated and many layered decision (I take care of elderly and ailing parents so do this balancing exercise every day on the opposite end of the spectrum from folks who have babies). But if you feel safe going out on date nights and hiring a babysitter for your baby so you can be out with your husband, perhaps each of you can additionally find time to occasionally do similar things to renew yourselves as individuals.

One of the things that I found challenging about the pandemic was that I had no new experiences and new insights about the world to bring back into my relationship to discuss and mull over and build on with my husband. Now as we are both able to do more outside our little pod of two - with friends, with clients, with students, with, family, there are more individual experiences building us up as the interesting people we are in the world, and have always been to each other, and we bring that back to our relationship. Perhaps that will help you as well?

Sorry to hear that you are having a hard time. I would echo what others have said regarding getting professional help.
However, I will add some small, simple tips....Keep a diary where you write atleast one positive thought about yourself every day. Also, re affirm the thought by looking in the mirror and telling yourself that positive thought. Make yourself a priority. Do things that you enjoy or make a conscious effort to enjoy one thing atleast in a day. Once you look at yourself positively, your conversations will flow.
Good luck. You can do it. 👍