POST BABY BODY SAGA.

"Is this normal?"

That is the question I set out to ask my doctor today. I made the appointment, citing my reason being that I had a few postpartum questions. Really I only had one and it had nothing to do with my health and everything to do with the humongous crater below my belly button. I thought that there was no way this could be normal and because I like to take the martyr route as often as possible, I was hoping to find out that I just had a case of really bad luck with my post baby body.

The doctor did not feed into that desire at all. "Make sure you moisturize those stretchmarks a lot! They will start to look better... it just takes a couple of years." When the doctor alluded to plastic surgery after I was done having kids, I knew I was doomed. I could never have plastic surgery (!!!) in light of all of the body positive preaching I try to do. Time to get used to it, I guess.

Step number one was going to the pool in my pre baby bikini in which my weirdo stomach and stretchmarks are probably completely overlooked because of how ill fitting my suit is now.

But back to my question: "Is this normal?" I truly had no idea, because (as I've mentioned before) I can't think of a single person that I've ever seen with stretchmarks, post baby or otherwise. Either I'm an extremely detail disoriented person (I'm not) or all y'all are doing a great job of keeping those hidden away (you are). Well, just tonight I was inspired by this photo series by Jade Beall, "A Beautiful Body" and plan on flaunting my mother-beast super body all summer long (and please, please, PLEASE flaunt what you've got too!). A little context goes a long way, and when you realize that you have plenty of allies working with the same stuff you are, you start to feel totally awesome.

Photo Credit:  Jade Beall