When you first find out you’re pregnant, you probably spend a lot of time scouring the web and reading books to work out what to expect. But there’s one thing, according to one new mom, that people can’t necessarily prepare you for, and that’s how you’ll feel when your body changes so dramatically.
Mother of two, Alexandra Kilmurray, has posted a brave Instagram photograph showing how her body was left with an abundance of stretch marks after her pregnancies, labeling it “the dark sides of motherhood and pregnancy.”
But her post goes on to become incredibly inspiring when she explains how it’s taken her a year and a half to feel confident in her own skin again, having learned to love the way she looks now.
In a picture of her stomach along with one of her babies, Alexandra started off the post writing: “I know a lot of you guys are probably thinking ‘why would she post this picture’, but, it took me 18 months to get here, 18 months to not cry when I look in the mirror, 18 months to finally feel beautiful in my own skin again.
“No one gives you a heads up on how much you change physically and mentally after you become a mother,” she goes on to say, before explaining that it took two children and a whole lot of time for her to “finally see the light” about the marks on her skin not making her any less beautiful, even though that’s how she’s felt for so long.
“Cheers to you mamas who are battling postpartum depression and still getting up everyday for your children,” Alexandra writes. “Cheers to you mamas who still cry about the marks on your skin from birthing your perfect babies,” she adds. “Cheers to motherhood, cheers to knowing that this too shall pass! And things will get better.”
It takes a lot to publicly display yourself in a way that will make you feel vulnerable but Alexandra has done it because she wants to share her own experience with other people who might be a little further behind than her.
If you get stretch marks as a result of pregnancy, you’re no different than many of the other woman who have experienced and will experience the same thing. So it’s important we read and share messages like Alexandra’s, from people who have realized there’s simply no place in their life to detest the way they look and have started appreciating themselves again.