I remember that although pregnancy didn't leave my body feeling glowing, it is probably the most impressed I've ever been with my body.
Before I got pregnant, my journey to love my fat body was one fraught with ups and downs but a state I more-or-less achieved. I'll be honest: In the beginning of my pregnancy, I truly didn't think it was physically possible to be that disgusted with yourself. I felt bloated and depressed and was constantly in a state of wondering if I looked "fat or pregnant–" a thought mere months ago I would have chided myself for thinking. But as my baby grew inside me, rounding out my stomach (and everything else) along with it, I was truly in awe of it.
My body had never had such ... purpose.
I don't mean that exestentially — I mean literally it had never done anything that remarkable. My body never cycled 99 miles to the shore. It never won a race or scored the winning goal. Yet here my fat body was, the one that so many doubted would yield a healthy pregnancy, having the healthiest gestational time anyone could ask for.
My labor wasn't overly long or arduous, and with an epidural I sucessfully had a vaginal delivery with minimal tearing. My son was a picture of health — and I did it all with this fat, "unworthy" body.
And although I ended my pregnancy journey truly loving and respecting my body, being officially postpartum presented a whole new set of challenges.
I gave myself a lot of grace in the month immediately following my delivery, but as time went on, my body was still just as foreign to me as the day I came home from the hospital. Even though I was back to my pre-baby weight, everything felt … different.
From my neck down it was like I was wearing someone else's body.
Despite the scale not reflecting anything much different than before, every article of clothing felt awkward. It hugged new curves that weren't there a few months before. Even though I wasn't breastfeeding, my breasts hung totally differently, and my hip shape utterly transformed.
I didn't personally stress too much because I just knew that "bounce back" was coming.
You know, the one "they" all promised. In some amount of time, my outfits would look the same, my body would start to feel like mine again, and it all seemed pretty promising.
But as time passed, in truth, my body only felt more and more changed.
Now 2 years later, I realized something: My body is never going to "bounce" back.
There is no way to have a pre-baby body ever again. Even if I stayed the same weight as I was before having my son — heck, even if I lose weight — there is no going back. The only body that I ever will have and the type of person that I ever will be will always be postpartum. It's a journey that I don't think truly has a destination, because it's not meant to.
Whether you're just recently pospartum or whether it's been years or even decades since, you've been forever changed by having that little one. No matter what your body looks like, the reality is that part of the person you once were disappeared the moment those two lines appeared.
I may not always love my postpartum body or even understand it, but one thing I am intent on doing is welcoming it.
This body is my only one, and I intend on honoring it no matter where it is on its journey. Because at the end of the day, this body, even my fat one, did one of the most miraculous things a body can do, and that is something I don't even want to bounce back from.
So if you're in your fourth trimester wondering when it'll go back to normal, I really want to challenge to you embrace your new normal. We're not meant to be stagnant creatures. We grow and evolve, and it is something worth celebrating.
