The Mama Stigma
Why I Let My Daughters Jiggle My Belly and play with it like play dough ♡
I feel that as women we have such a stigma about our bodies. What looks good and what doesn’t. You have to be a certain size. You can’t dress how you actually want to dress. What’s “acceptable” to wear. Honestly, I think no matter what age or size you are that you should look however the hell you want.
Growing up in a time where hip-hugger jeans were popular, crop tops, spaghetti straps & having no curves; was really hard for me. I had big boobs, big hips AND thick thighs. Definitely not the “in look”. Nowadays how I’m shaped is the desired look but then…not so much. Being a teenage girl is awful and sucks even more when you are the “big” girl. Which is why eating disorders are so common. I too had an eating disorder through most of my teenage years. That’s another story for another day.
I’m trying to stay on track here as to why I let my daughters poke and jiggle my body without hesitation.
Not until recently did I learn to love my body. Don’t get me wrong I always loved who I was and confidence was never an issue. But deep down I still HATED how my body looked. I have lost weight then gained weight. Then I lost said weight and gained it back, nothing consistent, no body transformation story. I’m sure you know how it goes. Having my first daughter pretty much changed the way my body looked. She was a 9lb baby and I didn’t “bounce back” immediately after she was born. I wasn’t too worried then because within 10 months I had lost all the weight I gained with her and then some.
Fast forward 2 years I am now back at my heaviest weight I’d ever been. Add in that I had recently found out I was preggo with daughter number 2. Well shit! I was beyond excited to have another gorgeous daughter, however, my body was about to undergo some serious trauma. She turned out to be a 10lb baby. Right before she was born I was at a pretty scary weight. Something I never thought I’d see on the scale when stepping on.
She ended up changing my body even more than my first daughter did. I’m still trying to get it together… 4 months later. During this time is when I learned to love my body. I did this because it wasn’t going to change any time soon.
Yo-Yo diets, eating disorder and having two babies that were c-section REALLY have taken a toll on my body. I know you can relate in some way or another. As women we all have had some sort of life challenge or change.
I think if I had learned from a young age to love the skin I was in OR to accept my body I would have had a different outlook on life. Loving my body as is, as long as I’m healthy. I think that I wouldn’t have had such a negative mindset for my body. I would have confronted the troubles I had with a better attitude rather than self sabotage.
Do you know why I let my daughters jiggle my belly? It’s because I want them to know I love my body, no matter what it looks like. I want to not be ashamed of having a little extra there. I want them to look in the mirror and be confident in their outfit. I want them to trust and know their body, instead of fighting it.
So mamas before you tell your kiddos don’t play with my belly like play dough. Think of what kind of message that is sending them…
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