Kimuya_N

“Gosh, me too!!! So much post-baby softness.”

I mull over this response wondering if she’d intended for it to land as poetically as it had. Thinking , I should pro’lly write about this softness. Rushing to get the next diaper change . And later, laughing at yet another post-partum meme. These postpartum body memes amuse me like a ceiling fan amuses a three-month-old.

So much air to clear with the body at the centre of it all.

Dear post-baby body,

First of all, you know I have loved you through every season. But I also don’t. (Always love you). Stay with me…

I love how you carried life with grace and stretched so quietly. I always wanted to ask you how you managed to stretch so quietly because I somehow expected to feel you expanding. Instead , I saw you bigger , but never felt that growth happening. Mysterious girl! I love that, afterwards, you tried to find your way back home, even when neither of us was entirely sure where home was anymore. Either way, you tried.

But there are just a few things I thought we could talk about.

I am amused by your new interests and your defiant refusal to face forward as you once did.

In particular, I wonder why these milk taps relentlessly search for the navel instead of looking forward with wonder. I also wonder why the once perfectly round twins now have a natural disposition towards the south, as though they are looking for the toes.

It could be the weight of all the milk they carry. I get it.

But did you also change their marching orders and instruct them to keep their eyes at floor level? Please remind them to look up once in a while. There is still so much of the world to see up here, I promise.

Then there are the love handles around the waist. They came for a short visit and appear to have settled in permanently. They sit pretty while I negotiate with jeans that refuse to close. I shifted to mom jeans, and still, we negotiate. As if settling in was not enough, they invited their cousins and perched them comfortably just beside my ribs. These ones, I must say, I dislike.

I dislike how they fold cosily beside the bra, and even more how they show off boldly and loudly whenever I attempt to wear one of my fitted tees.

Speaking of which , I miss my fitted Tees era. And the crop top dream that never took off.

I have also noticed the little tummy pouch you brought my way.

Oh boy!

Also, it is not little.

Was it part of the plan for it to form that sagging, inverted C whenever I turn sideways in front of the mirror? Or is this simply another one of your new interests?

And hey, I was thinking that perhaps the patches of loose skin is simply your way of reminding me that we are meant for more . There’s more of us now, more body, more skin, more softness. More evidence of where we have been.

Sometimes I look at you with gratitude. Sometimes with amusement. Sometimes I tug at my clothes and wonder whether you and I are even on speaking terms.

Still, I see you.

I dress you. I laugh with you. I occasionally complain about you. And even when loving you does not come naturally, I am learning not to treat you like something that went wrong.

Because just like me, you did not return untouched from motherhood.

Yours,

K!