I’m Finally Buying New Clothes

Because I’m sick of waiting for my body to be good enough

Photo by Sam Lion from Pexels

My FUPA hangs inelegantly over the waistband of my too-tight yoga pants. My stomach protrudes from underneath my too-short t-shirts. My thighs strain against the seams of my go-to, pre-pregnancy stretchy pants.

I’ve long retired my itty-bitty, pre-pregnancy thongs. For almost three years, I’ve been wearing my pregnancy underwear — the underwear I wore when I was 40 pounds heavier, the underwear that’s still stained from all the strange pregnancy secretions.

My sagging breasts feel as though they are betraying me for gravity, and I still live in my stretched-out nursing tank tops.

You see, I haven’t bought clothes for myself since I gave birth to my daughter over two years ago. I don’t own any clothes in my size.

I’ve been clinging to the hope that if I could just lose the baby weight, I could go back to my pre-pregnancy wardrobe and not waste any money on transitional clothes. Today, I’m still several sizes larger than before, and for the past two years, I’ve resorted to sausaging myself into my pre-pregnancy clothes.

I’d always been a size small. And while I’m ashamed to admit it, I took pride in it. Recently, I’ve associated “size small” with my youth and beauty in…