Last night I sat on the floor of the bathroom, hand-expressing milk from my engorged breast into the shower drain. I was on the phone with one of my closest friends, a mother of two, and we laughed aloud at the absurdity of my situation. At how weird our bodies are now. Miraculous, but weird.
I have a long history of battling my body, trying to make it something it’s not.
“We’ll never be the same again, honey.” she told me. I’ve known her long enough to be able to tell that she was grinning and shaking her head. “Yeah,” I sighed, “that’s for sure.”
She’s right, of course. We will never be the same. Pregnancy and birth have altered the warp and weft of our bodies in a multiplicity of ways, some that I’m still finding out about with every passing day. Just like everything else about motherhood, this bodily transformation, too, has been difficult to wrap my head around.
I have a long history of battling my body, trying to make it something it’s not. I’ve exercised obsessively and stood in front of mirrors thinking horrible things about myself. I’ve starved myself to the point of fainting. Twelve years ago I lost myself in the work of diminishing myself beyond recognition. I counted calories obsessively, trying to lower my intake each day. I bottomed out at 500 calories a day, a point of perverse pride.
I know that this doesn’t make me unique. In fact, I’ve never met a woman without a complex relationship with her body and a history rife with bitter internal (and external) battles. My body and I have mostly been wary allies—stuck with each other but not happy about it.
Initially, I was afraid of being pregnant. Having spent years negotiating an armistice with my body I was nervous about what all the change would do. Would my eating disorder come roaring back to terrorize me? Would I be able to accept my fluctuating self, maybe even acknowledge the marvel taking place inside me? Or would I just hate every minute?
With every fluttery kick I became more aware of the magic of what was happening inside me. The more I focused on that, the less I focused on calories.
Some days were better than others. I did not love every minute of being pregnant. But I also didn’t succumb to my past disorder, although I never stopped being conscious of how much weight I was putting on relative to what the twisted voices in my head told me that I should be. Sporadic comments (“You know, pregnant women don’t need to gain more than 20 pounds,” one person offered helpfully as we ate a meal together) didn’t help. It took me a long time to be at peace with my changing body, but it did happen. My baby moved endlessly in my womb (a trait he retains to this day), and with every fluttery kick I became more aware of the magic of what was happening inside me. The more I focused on that, the less I focused on calories and was able to give myself over to the experience of being a haven for a growing person. By the end of my pregnancy I felt like a walking wonder, albeit a waddling one. I enjoyed my body. I am grateful to have found love for my pregnant body with all its woes before my nine months were over.
Now that my baby is nine months old, I’m facing a new challenge: finding love for my postpartum body.
In the weeks after my son was born I took long baths with lavender oil (I had time for this because of postpartum insomnia), placing my hands on my empty belly and crying. Everything about my body felt foreign—the episiotomy stitches, the sticky black goo from the epidural tape that refused to be scrubbed off, the spidery veins crawling up my legs. I tried to breathe in the steam between choking sobs. When I was done crying I’d lie there with my eyes closed, trying to grasp the enormity of my transformation.
Eventually, I stopped.
A few weeks ago, while stepping out of the shower, I glanced in the mirror and realized that I’ve been avoiding myself. That is to say, I haven’t looked at myself in the mirror in a long, long time. I’ve been getting out of the shower, gaze trained on the tile floor, wrapping myself in a towel and hurrying to put on my pajamas.
So I looked. And I tried to be kind. I tried to see.
My hips are wider than they used to be, as are my feet. My breasts hang low on my chest. Heavy, like overripe fruit. It can’t be denied that they droop and flop, no longer any kind of perky. My nipples are raw. One shows a recent bite mark, purpleish and sharp. The shadow of my linea nigra splits my belly into crooked hemispheres. My eyes are tired, with dark half moons beneath them. I have many more white hairs. My left knee aches constantly where the ligaments have gotten loose. My spider veins are spidery as ever, sketching a lacy turquoise pattern on my calves.
My feet held us both up, even when he lived inside me. They still do. My eyes are soft with love. My legs are strong, even muscular. So are my shoulders. They bear weight.
I took a deep breath, closed my eyes. Opened them. And looked again.
My hips are wide because they birthed a child, who now crawls around the living room and points at the ceiling with a drooly grin, declaring, “Bap!” My breasts feed him daily, somehow knowing exactly which nutrients he needs in order to grow. They hang heavily because they are filled with the milk that has helped him triple in size since he was born. My feet held us both up, even when he lived inside me. They still do. My eyes are soft with love. My legs are strong, even muscular. So are my shoulders. They bear weight.
Both of these are true pictures of my body.
It’s not easy to choose to see myself through this prism. There are many days that I don’t. I have practiced punishing my body for most of my life and turning that attitude around will undoubtedly be a project for many years to come. But I know something now that I didn’t know before I made a person: all this measuring, weighing, squeezing—it’s not mine. It’s a distraction, something to keep us busy so that we don’t realize that our frame is not the point. The point is that our bodies are magic makers. We hold great power. We create life. We nurture people into existence. We carry all kinds of weight.
The bothness is what I am training myself to see. One day at a time. As long as I’m stuck with this body, I might as well learn to love it.
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