I Think My Butt is Pregnant

You are probably one of those women who looked gorgeous and radiant while you were pregnant, aren’t you? You probably only gained weight in your belly and no one could even tell you were pregnant until you were six months along. Did you wear your regular jeans until you were eight months pregnant using the rubber band technique? I bet you did. I bet you don’t even know what I’m talking about when I say varicose veins, hemorrhoids, stretch marks, heartburn and excessive flatulence. Are you one of those women who enjoyed your pregnancy so much that you practically start lactating just thinking about being pregnant again?

If so, we have nothing in common. I was one of those ladies that took a pregnancy test at six weeks and immediately looked pregnant. Except that I got pregnant everywhere except my belly first. I think my butt was the most pregnant of all. I kept asking my midwife to check for a heartbeat back there, because I was convinced I was having some sort of anatomically abnormal pregnancy where I was carrying a couple of extra babies in my rear end.

I love the pregnancy books that tell you anywhere between 25 and 30 pounds is acceptable weight gain for a pregnancy. I think I gained 25 pounds in the first 3 months. The funny thing is, I was thin before I became pregnant. I was always thin. I thought, I believed, I just knew I was going to be one of those beautiful pregnant mamas who could wear sexy strapless gowns while I was going into my ninth month.

But I wasn’t. My first pregnancy I gained 50 pounds. I’m not even going to tell you how much weight I gained in my second. I tried really hard to work out and eat healthy, but my body wanted to gain weight. It sucked on weight. It devoured weight. If I so much as walked past a doughnut or slice of coconut cream pie or chicken chimichanga, I could feel my butt expanding.

Pregnancy did all kinds of unusual things to my body. For one, it made me fat, which I didn’t expect. But we’ve already covered that. Second, it made me sick. I was so sick I could barely function the first half of both of my pregnancies. I constantly felt like puking my guts out and the only thing that made the nausea better was eating, which is bizarre but true.

Pregnancy also took my allergies away and gave me new ones. Before I was pregnant, I was terribly allergic to dust, mold, feathers and fur. I had been on allergy medication since I was 17. I got off the meds while I was pregnant because they were not safe for my unborn baby. I expected to have an awful time, coughing and sneezing and blowing boogers all over the place. But in fact, I was completely fine. Oddly enough, though, I became allergic to eye makeup and could no longer wear mascara or eyeliner without my eyelids puffing up and making me look like I had been disfigured in a horrible accident.

Despite the crippling nausea and feeling traumatized by the cellulite on my arms, I managed to make it through my entire first pregnancy wearing cute clothes and high heels. I was determined to at least make the package look fabulous, regardless of the contents inside. For this, I have been eternally punished, I now realize, because I can no longer bear to wear anything but tennis shoes and flip flops on my tender, long-suffering feet. Even when I go out on dates with my husband I have to really psyche myself up to put on a pair of shoes that doesn’t have rubber soles. My feet, I think, are experiencing post-traumatic-pregnancy-high-heel-syndrome and have not recovered. Maybe counseling would help.

Losing weight after my first pregnancy was easy. It just came right off. I was greatly relieved and convinced that the pregnancy experts that make you feel like a cow if you gained anything over 31 pounds were wrong. But my second pregnancy was different. I gained more weight and, on top of this, it was so much harder to exercise with two children. I couldn’t just go walking anytime I wanted. Or jump onto the elliptical trainer the minute my husband came home. Not to mention, nursing makes me incredibly hungry and I must admit that my appetite is just larger now than it ever was before I had kids.

Which brings me to the main point I wanted to make. Pregnancy and its aftereffects made me realize that I should have enjoyed my body more before I ever got pregnant. Like most women, I spent too much time comparing myself to actresses and supermodels and finding myself coming up short. Sure I was a size two, but did I have a 24-inch waist and perky C-cup breasts? Oh no, I must be deficient in some way. I could always find fat rolls and hidden cellulite. What no one ever tells you is that these are your best years, the years when you are overly critical about your body. The years when you really have nothing to be critical about at all.

Once you have a baby, no matter how hard you work on your body, it will never be exactly the same. Certain things sag that didn’t beforehand. Varicose veins start popping out in places you didn’t know you had veins. And the stretch marks arrive. You get hemorrhoids, which you thought was something only old people had. Oh, yes. There are lots of secrets to the postpartum body that no one wants to talk about.

It doesn’t help that all the models and actresses having babies these days show up in magazines three months after they give birth, looking thinner and in better shape than before they ever had children. But, trust me, if we had three nannies, a personal trainer, and someone to airbrush all our photos, we would look awesome too.

This is real life, so let’s appreciate our real bodies. For one thing, let’s appreciate the fact that our bodies are capable of forming another human inside and then pushing it out. Wow. That’s some wild stuff. So, it’s okay if we have a little extra pudge right now. Of course our tummies are a little flabby. And our boobs are a little saggy. And maybe we have a few stretch marks, or mommy tattoos, as I like to call them.

But you know what? We can reach our feet again and put on our own shoes. And, even if we have a little extra around the middle, we still look great. We are going to get back in shape again. Just not right now. Let’s relax for about six months after our babies are born, eat healthy and enjoy our newborn infants. Let’s not obsess about being skinny and forget to enjoy the beauty of these special moments with our tiny baby that will never come again. We have the rest of our lives to get back to (sort of) the way we were.

Naomi de la Torre is a stay-at-home-mom with two delightful boys, ages two and five. Naomi has an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Arizona, is a self-proclaimed salsa diva and can make a killer octopus out of a single hot dog.