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Fall Pink and Blue 2017
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fall 2017 | pink ? blue 37 baby??there was even a ?fabu
lou
s after babies!? i, on the other hand, could barely walk. ?don?t worry,? the nurses kept saying, ?you?ll be back in a bikini in no time.? even though the weight was falling off, i was doubtful. my husband, ian, assured me i was still sexy to him. but i found it impossible to access that part of
myself
when there was a mound of silly putty between us. i loved ian, and i loved west and
lou
, but i quite simply didn?t know who i was anymore. ?en life threw us a curveball. our son
lou
was diagnosed with a brain tumor. besides being terrifying, the diagnosis felt like a smack in the face. who cared about my bombed-out middle when my child had cancer? i quickly brushed my issues aside, ashamed that i had felt them in the first place. yet even during
lou
?s treatment, i couldn?t escape my stomach. ?you can?t be around the chemo if you?re pregnant,? nurses would say. or my favorite, ?can we talk about what?s going on under there?? i wouldn?t know ?what was going on under there? for some time, but i did learn something invaluable in the hospital. i learned how much love i was capable of.
why
, then, couldn?t i love
myself
too? once
lou
was fully recovered (he remains cancer-free!), i could no longer ignore the pain in my core. a specialist diagnosed me with three hernias and a severe diastasis, a condition where one?s stomach muscles separate from the abdominal wall, which is how i found
myself
buck naked in a plastic surgeon?s office, getting marked up with a black pen. ?we?re cutting you open anyway,? the doctor?s reasoning went. i remember staring at
myself
in the mirror under the harsh hospital lights i had come to know so well. he tried to convince me to get the full mommy makeover: tummy tuck, boob and butt lifts, liposuction?but i opted for just the tummy tuck. ?you?ll feel like your old self again.? his words were music to my ears. ?ere was a part of me that secretly hoped he?d make it all go away. ?e silly putty, my shame, pregnancy,
lou
?s cancer. i so longed to be the woman who had known none of the above. i kept trying to validate the surgery by telling friends, ?it?s partially covered by insurance.? i don?t know
why
i couldn?t own it. ?don?t tell anyone,? a friend said. ?when people ask what you did to yourself, just say you?ve been working really hard,? which of course intimated that i just hadn?t worked hard enough before. ?e recovery was brutal. i couldn?t hold the boys for eight weeks. but i won?t lie. i did take selfies of
myself
back in my 501s. i was, finally, ?fabu
lou
s after babies.? except i wasn?t. even though the ?mom flap? was gone, and the surgeon had sucked out excess fat from my butt and hips (a courtesy?), i was still pretty miserable. i still didn?t feel sexy, and i was just as conf licted about motherhood, career, and all the things that plagued me before i erased the rite of passage from my body. w hich is
why
i wasn?t too upset when, a year later, the skin on my stomach started to fall again. the surgeon suggested a second tuck; i declined. something had changed. i started writing a book, i took up meditation. i was slowly finding balance as a mother and an artist. i started healing the wounds of cancer and working on my marriage. i found
myself
, despite the fallen skin, quite fabu
lou
s, thank you ver y much. while my story may be more extreme than some mamas? (and less extreme than others?), i think we can all benefit from the importance of honoring our journeys from maidenhood to motherhood.
why
are we not empowered to marvel at the wear and tear? i learned that it?s only in celebrating our rocky rides and committing to loving ourselves as much as we love our babes that we can truly accept the fierce mamas we have become. as my favorite t-shirt says: ?mama knows.? she sure does.
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