TMI: The Post-Partum Body

Here beginneth the third chapter of the Book of Yoga Pants, wherein I battle back from my I-bore-a-baby body one final time. 

At the moment, my body is a strange assortment of lumps and bumps. There is dough everywhere. It is a study in fabric draping, except that it is not fabric hanging around, it is my skin. 

Until just a few days ago, my incision was still covered in steri-strips. There were so many of them that they looked like a row of long, skinny teeth smiling across my lower abdomen. It was a pretty goofy smile. Half cute, half horror flick. The strips itched like crazy, and I am so happy they are gone. My body is all mine again now.

The incision site is still a bit temperamental--stinging and pulling one moment, and then the next it seems to be without nerve endings at all, as though nothing ever happened. 

And yes, there’s a flappy underbelly thing going on. I know it will be with me for a long, long time.

My breasts are on fire a lot of the time. They weigh about 8 pounds each. They hurt so much and get so engorged that they are hot to the touch. Thankfully, Bronwen doesn’t seem to mind. I am fantasizing about the cabbage leaf and quark treatment. My chest pulls me over with its weight. It gives me headaches. Pumping helps.

The breast weight and my hesitancy to really stand up straight and stretch out my lower abdomen make me feel like I am walking around like the hunchback of Notre Dame. This, in turn, makes my back ache. I am trying to channel my two grandmothers and stand up tall and proud, rolling those shoulders up and back and down...

I long to exercise. I satisfy myself with meager walks around the neighborhood. 

I am attempting to make healthy eating choices, but I will be the first to admit that there are way too many carbs and sweets in the rotation these days.

I know, I know. I can already hear you. I'm not even three weeks post-partum. People tell me I'm looking great (and I love them for it), and for the most part I am in fact pretty well. But underneath the surface, underneath the clothing, is a body which is a foreign landscape to me right now. I am doing my best to be patient with it, but we all know patience is not my greatest strength.

I am trying to treasure all that comes with renewed mommyhood--and I really, truly treasure so much right now--but the physical limitations are making me crazy. Just a little. A manageable crazy. A typical "me" level of crazy.

Yours from the couch,

The GM

Anatomy of a Mini: part three

Moving right along in the mini album. (Cover is here. Part one is here. Part two is here.) These pages are fairly self-explanatory, so I won't go into great (and often boring) detail.

But I will say this about the "enjoy" layout below: the blue butterfly hiding Madelyn's private parts and the orange/pink circle on Jillson do not actually appear on the layout in the album. In the album, they are 100% nakey. I just felt the girls might prefer it if I did NOT share their private parts with the entire internet.

A rare photo of the Gutsy Family pre-kids:

A favorite quotation from Eleanor Roosevelt (thank you, 10th grade American history class), paired nicely with a photo from the Gutsy Dad's marathon and another from a stations-of-the-cross hike through the German countryside.

Unfortunately, when these two pages ended up next to each other in the finished album, the result was rather busy. Na ja.

"Cherish" turned out to be one of my favorite layouts in the album -- our crazy life by the numbers. (And one of the more recent pictures of us. Since I made this album in August, this is the only photo in which Bronwen "appears.")

Only one more installment to go!

Photo Shoot Struggles

I tried very hard to take some adorable two-week-old pictures of Bronwen Eliza on Monday. She was not pleased. This was the best shot I could get:

Things got a little better when I added in the "props," aka Big Sister and Double Big Sister.

God only knows what they were planning to do:

Time to review the "don't bite your friends" episode of Yo Gabba Gabba:

I thought a little dress might help cheer Bronwen up. I was wrong. Again, this was the best shot I could get:

At least, later on, when Bronnie fell asleep on the couch, I was able to get a cute sleeping picture with the phone. Love those CHEEKS!

Today we had Bronwen Eliza's two-week check-up, and she passed with flying colors.