Before I got pregnant, I really didn’t like my body. I thought I was fat, thought I wasn’t good enough, you know… things a lot of young girls and women deal with. I gained weight and got stretch marks, and that sent me into a deep dark place of self-loathing and despair that I wasn’t beautiful anymore.
And then I found out I was somehow the .01% and had conceived on the pill.
For the first few days I worried about my body. I worried about how I would look and how I would change. Would I hate my body more? Would it matter?
Days went by and I started liking my body. My body was the same body, but I saw it in a different light. I started feeling its power, the power of life. I was making a life! I mean, I AM making a life!
Now, my belly is growing bigger everyday, and at 19 weeks along, I’m still loving my body. I’m stretching and aching and expanding, but my heart and mind are, too. My idea of beauty is changing. Yes, I know I’ll never look the same, I know I’ll never have my smooth teen tummy back…and I’m okay with that.
I’ve searched the internet so many times looking for women whose self-esteem INCREASED during pregnancy, but I can’t find any! All I find is, “How to boost your self-esteem during pregnancy.” “‘I HATE MY PREGNANT BODY!'” “I love my kids, but hate how they’ve changed my body.”
I want women to know they don’t have to hate their pregnant bodies. I want women, and young girls especially, to realize our bodies change completely after a baby and it’s okay. We’re still beautiful. We’re still the same person we were before we conceived. The things in life that are most important are things we can’t see or touch, but things we feel… people we love.
I want women to see this one positive search result in a world full of negative search results.
awesome post! even at my cute-young-girl-skinniest, i was paranoid about my paunchy belly. inherited this fear from my mom, who always complained about her belly.
pregnancy encourages us to looove that belly, to wear clothes that cling to it and show it off. i ended up having the most ridiculous looking, enormous belly ever. and it was great. i noticed how i didn’t pay attention to the tummy anymore, and didn’t like it or focus on it, postpartum. i still have a big postpartum belly, almost like i’m in early pregnancy, and this is over a year since my son’s birth.
i hope you and we can carry that great body attitude past the pregnancy and into our everyday lives! there’s a postpartum real bodies website somewhere that i would recommend to ANY pregnant woman…. lets you know what you’re in for and celebrates the reality of women’s bodies.
I’m 22 y.o. and 27 weeks pregnant and I’m loving my new pregnant body! Before I got pregnant I was a size 0-2 with pretty much no boobs. Now I feel so much more feminine and beautiful, I love the curve of my belly, my bigger boobs and butt, everything! For a while I was getting sad over gaining weight really fast and people’s mean comments about how I’m so big, but now I don’t even pay attention to the scale, and it’s very freeing. It’s like my body has a purpose, a deeper meaning than just to be enjoyed sexually. I love that.
This helped me. I am a size 14, and this accidental pregnancy really is making me feel better about myself.
Its nice to know others are feeling like this.
Thank you for this posts! And thank you to all you commentors!! I really needed this, needed to hear this!
I love my pregnant body! I also conceived on birth control – and found out much later in the pregnancy because of it. I love my belly, I love the softness and the curve. I love the fact that I don’t count calories anymore, I can indulge in a muffin for breakfast and not feel guilt. I still eat very healthy, but do not beat myself up over an ice cream sandwich. It is such a weird journey, but I love the way I feel now physically more than before I knew I was pregnant
Idk if anyone is still following this post, but I had my baby and she’s five months old now! D;
I still love my body. It is floppy, and leaky, and squishy, I got stretch marks up to my ears, and I’m carrying around a few extra pounds, but I carried a baby. It blows my mind everyday that she started out as two cells (I didn’t know it was a she when I wrote this post!!!!) And grew into a little girl.
I had a rough, unexpected, unplanned hospital birth that is it’s own post, and my girl had to stay in the nicu for about two weeks. I have struggled a little bit, but I am happy to say, my body image doesn’t torture me the way it used to.
I am happy.