The Shape of a Mother

Ever since I found out I was pregnant, I've felt as though I no longer had any control over my body. My son is now 3 years old, and I am finally beginning to feel like I have a tenuous claim of ownership over my body. I've never been skinny. Whilst my friends tended to fall into the cute, pixie-faced petite blonde category of human, I'm tall, strong, brunette and curvy. It's isolating. Being surrounded by people but never feeling like one of them is desperately isolating. It's lonely. When I fell pregnant aged 21 it was even more difficult to feel like I had any connection to them. My friends with babies had fallen away from my world after high school. They majority of them were pregnant within a few months of finishing our GCSEs at age 16, moved into a house in town with their boyfriends and made a life for themselves as a mummy. I stayed in school to sit my A levels, I went to university, I travelled. I never planned to be a mummy, it just wasn't on my radar. My close friends were the same. Even those who were settling down and getting married weren't having babies yet. Once again, I felt stuck out on a limb and on my own. When my baby was born I felt awful. My complete lack of control over my body was suddenly hugely apparent. I was a fit, strong UK size 14 when he was born. I ballooned to a size 18 because I loaded up with sugar. It was the only thing which could make me feel like I had any energy. I had stretch marks from my thighs to my boobs and everywhere between. I went from a 34C to a 36E, which give me back trouble, something I'd never experienced before.
But how the heck was I going to lose weight and get back into shape? I was a final year university student, with a young baby. I wanted to get back into playing rugby, but my knee wasn't up to it (I'd torn the medial collateral ligament, twice, and when I eventually did try to play again I managed a week and a half training before I blew my knee out totally, snapping the anterior cruciate ligament and the medial meniscus cartilage which resulted in surgery). I don't have the time to go to the gym, or swim or run. I certainly can't afford it. So I just lived. I went out with my friends and danced while finishing my degree. I got a job working in my local pub, and then at the rugby club, so I was always on the move and laughing, so much laughing! I went back to summer camp and spent my summer riding ponies and walking around camp and swimming in the lake. And steadily the weight came off. But even though now, three years later, I am smaller than I was before I found out I was pregnant, I'm a completely different shape. My post-baby boobs are different sizes. My tummy looks like a sagging carrier bag of oatmeal, draped over some killer abs (they're there, they're just hiding). My arms are bulkier with muscle, because lifting my boy takes some effort. I'm not OK with this.
I breathed a sigh of relief and had a little smile to myself when this picture of Julia Roberts appeared in magazines. A celebrity mummy who hadn't rushed to her plastic surgeon to have
a tummy tuck and breast lift. Hurrah! There was hope for us all! But it wasn't enough. I'm much younger than Julia Roberts, and my friends are my age without the mum-tums. Whilst I've never felt pressured to conform, knowing what my body used to be like and and it is now upsets me. Then I found this website and our unhealthy attitudes to the naked female body whilst randomly clicking StumbleUpon. It meant something to me. Having been a rugby player I was familiar with the variety and stunning beauty of all our bodies. Team showers after matches for me weren't a torturous ordeal but just another thing which held us together not only as a team but as friends. Carrying our conversations about the match, the state of our latest unfinished essays, our plans to get silly celebrating that night, or whatever mundane topic was up for discussion we'd drag ourselves in from the pitch, get undressed and all head to the shower. The conversations would continue regardless, although perhaps with the occasional deviation to comment on what a great set of boobs someone has! Reading through that website though, I came across this. The Shape of a Mother. It's wonderful. At last something which says more than just "you're beautiful" or "you're body did something amazing", but instead says "I know how it can make you feel ugly, I understand how you can feel hijacked, but you are still a beautiful woman, wobbly bits, screaming toddler and all". I urge all my fellow mummies to go and check it out to see that every one's body recovers from pregnancy differently, but every one's body changes. And all of you without children, please read it too. Realise that when you stare, a little bit grossed out, at my mum-tum when I walk around in a bikini, I am no longer going to feel ashamed, but proud of what that means.

Watching - Charlie, attempting to balance on a stool shaped like an elephant, and failing dismally. The boy is a constant work-out for my giggle-gland :D
Listening - to the music in my head, which is currently the song "Hurt" by Nine Inch Nails / Johnny Cash. My internal monologue is trying to decide which version is better.
Wearing - Black leggings, an over sized pink vest I "distressed", and a purple and slate check shirt.
Reading - lots of Dr. Seuss. I feel slightly deprived having never read them as a child.
Wanting - Dairy Milk.