Dear Post Partum Body

Dear post partum body,

First and foremost, thank you!!!!  Thank you for the most amazing gift I will ever receive!  Thank you for holding out and giving me a healthy son.  I know it was hard for you and you needed lots of help, but here we are...snuggled up with our perfect little boy on my chest!  So thank you for that.

I know I had a hard time accepting you in the beginning.  That was due in part the not being able to accept that I was pregnant or that it would end well.  There is not enough dialogue or information out there for transitioning to pregnancy after infertility.  I thought it would be easy.  It was not.  So being that I couldn't accept that I was, indeed, pregnant and that it actually might result in a child, I could not accept my changing body very well.  And the guilt for this was tremendous.

As you know, I spent the last few years of my life busting ass to get healthy. Ironically enough, it started as an effort to get pregnant.  I took a lot of pride I'm how far I had come.  And by the time we did IVF, I had muscle dimples, I wore shorts for the first time in my adult life. I had lost roughly 70lbs!  I liked my arms and and legs. I felt strong and energetic! I loved how I felt.

Then I watched all that work slowly disappear behind a body that I didn't recognize.  I knew in my head that I was pregnant! All the tests and facts told me so.  But still, I couldn't accept it.  But I knew, underneath all that raw emotion, it would be worth it.  But my immediate emotions were taking over. So I came here to get it out so I wouldn't come across as ungrateful to all my hurting friends still giving everything they have to be where I was.

Now, I look at the leftovers of my body.  The aftermath of 9 months of strain.  9 months of sharing my body and my nutrients with my little man.  3 of those months spent in a recliner where I was left to deteriorate even further.  I see extra skin sagging off my belly.  I see no muscle definition.  I see stretch marks and boobies the size of bowling balls that leak giant puddles down my shirt. I see sunken in eyeballs with dark circles underneath. I see a weak, strained body. I have carpal tunnel. I can't feel my fingers. My feet were so swollen, I didn't have ankles. I see no evidence that just 9 months ago, I was in the best shape of my life.

But I have never had so much pride in my body than I do right now!  And though I am excited beyond words to get healthy again, in a weird way, I will be sad to see it go.  It is evidence that my body is capable of doing something amazing.  Something I never thought I could do.  And even with the scary stuff we went through during pregnancy, it still held out!

I had thought that I didn't get any stretch marks on my belly. Well upon checking out my incision yesterday, I lifted up the gob of extra skin and noticed that I did, indeed, get some! I am happy about that because as I get back into shape and the evidence that I had a baby disappears, I will always have those reminders.  Those little souvenirs from Mason.

Coming from an infertile background, I know that it is a possibility that this may be my only chance to experience growing a life.  And while it may not be the experience I had hoped for, I am beyond thankful to have the experience!