Do you ever sit down to watch TV and you can’t? Like your internet is out for some random reason, the streaming is bad, the next episode of your show isn’t up, etc. That’s happening to me right now. And usually when this happens, I take it as a sign from the universe that I should be doing something better with my time than crying over This Is Us. So here I am, attempting to write so many of the thoughts that have been swimming in my head for, honestly, about the past year. And oh how I wish my laptop wasn’t on the fritz right about now so that I wasn’t typing this in the notes app on my phone. But when the urge to write is there I try to follow it regardless of the circumstances, including technological difficulties.

Once I found out I was pregnant last January, one of the first things I wondered (and worried) about, was how this whole experience would change my body. If you haven’t followed me or know the history of my health, in a nutshell I was slightly “overweight” we’ll call it, for most of my life and once I got old enough to become the victim of marketing that preyed on my insecurities I tried just about everything to lose weight. When none of that worked, I focused on getting healthy, and what do you know, as a result the weight my body didn’t need disappeared. When I found out I was pregnant, I was about at the peak of my journey to better health and I was really proud of the body that had come with it. I looked fit, was the smallest size I had ever been as an adult and I had some guns! It took a long time for me to start looking pregnant. Finally by around 23 weeks, it was obvious. And that’s when the comments about my body started rolling in.

*Now let me preface this next part. If you said any of the following phrases to me while I was pregnant, I wasn’t offended, I’m not upset with you, and I know your intentions were good. No need to apologize.

You see, throughout my pregnancy I tried to maintain my healthy lifestyle. I tried to eat lots of nutrient dense food and do workouts that were safe for both me and baby. I think a lot of people assumed that’s why I looked small. After being terrified of gaining weight in the past, I wasn’t all that thrilled with that inevitable part of growing a human inside me. And I’d be lying if I didn’t say part of me was continuing to eat well and workout so I wouldn’t gain as much weight as I might if I didn’t do those things. (But most of me was continuing to do those things because they make me feel good, pregnant or not.) Anyways. So when I heard comments like:

“Oh my gosh, I look more pregnant than you after that lunch I just ate!”

“Wow You can’t even tell you’re pregnant from behind.

“You’re all baby.”

It felt good. But at the same time I started noticing a theme behind all of these statements. For one, so many of the comments or statements that were intended as compliments, were all in regards to what I looked like physically. And two, the undertone was what we’ve all been taught to believe: being small is good and being big is bad. (And that the smaller you are, the healthier you are.)

So yeah, I enjoyed those comments at first. But the more I heard them, the more I realized how obsessed our society is with physical appearance. (I’m not excluding myself here either.) And it really started to bother me. Because what if I didn’t look this way? And what about other people who don’t look this way? What comments do they hear?

Oh, I know. Because I got some of those comments too. (And am also guilty of saying them to other women in the past.)

“Dang girl, you got even bigger over the weekend!”

“Is your due date tomorrow?” (Seriously, from a stranger in Hobby Lobby.)

“Eight more weeks? You look like you’re ready to pop any day!”

Sometimes I’d get comments about being small AND being big in the same day. This made me realize that everyone’s opinions are so relative to their own personal experiences. Because if I was smaller than they were (or their sister, friend, neighbor, other woman they know of, was) at that given point in my pregnancy, to them I was small, with the opposite being true if I was bigger.

Overall I gained 30 pounds. And the ONLY reason I’m even mentioning this number is because I think it’s important to acknowledge that I still gained weight despite how small anyone thought I was, and despite eating pretty healthy and working out because that’s what your body does when you’re pregnant. Truthfully I felt like I had pretty little control over what shape my body took on. And unless someone throws all caution to the wind and eats everything in sight just simply “because they’re pregnant,” I’d imagine that most women don’t have much to do with the shape they take on while they’re pregnant either. 30 pounds was a healthy pregnancy for me, while it could have ended up being an unhealthy pregnancy for someone else. And the same goes for 15 pounds and even 60 pounds. That number says so little out of context.

After I had the baby, I kind of thought the weight I had gained would just disappear because nearly half of it did immediately following birth. And because I had continued my healthy habits up until the last few weeks of my pregnancy. But to my surprise, when I went back for my six week check up, I had gained back most of that and currently weigh almost as much as I did the day I gave birth.

And what I hear now?

“Girl, you don’t even look like you just had a baby!”

And I awkwardly say thanks and just try to change the subject because I know it’s intended as a compliment. But it’s unintetionally implying that it’s bad if I do look like I just had a baby. And I DO look like I just had a baby underneath my clothes. And that’s okay. Actually, it’s more than okay. And the fact that any of us have ever been made to believe that it’s not, or that trying to reverse the changes to our bodies should be our priority (ever, but especially) immediately following birth is such a shame.

This has not been effortless for me to believe. In fact there have been some tears over it. Which is why I took time to write this. Because no new mom (or ANY person for that matter) needs to waste even a second feeling like this. There are SO many things that are more worthy of our attention during this season of life (like spending all the time we can enjoying the new life we brought into the world and resting and healing from the intense physical event, and nine months, our bodies just went through). But in order for us to remember that, we’ve ALL got to change the way we talk about our own size, or someone else’s size. Regardless of whether they are pregnant, postpartum, or neither. So what DO we say about it?

Nothing.

Because size is not indicative of health. Small does not always mean healthy. Big does not always mean unhealthy. What’s small to you may be big to someone else, and vice versa. A big baby bump on one person might be healthier than a small baby bump on another person. A person who looks like they “never had a baby” may be doing really unhealthy things to appear that way, and a person who is taking time to heal themselves and focus on other things besides their appearance may look unhealthy.

And regardless of what size someone is, and how healthy or unhealthy they are, neither of those things has anything to do with their worth. Neither of those things have anything to do with YOUR worth. You are not more worthy of happiness, success or love if you have a six pack, eat fruits and vegetables at every meal and wear a size small. I didn’t have a six pack, but those other two things are true of another point in my life. And guess what? I wasn’t any more deserving of happiness, success or love than I am right now with my tummy rolling over the top of my jeans.

In the past I read stuff like I’m writing now and I really couldn’t buy into it. My mentality just wasn’t there, yet. And if you can’t buy into this now either, that’s okay. Just know that it’s true whether you feel like it is or not. Something that helped me overcome this was noticing things about myself that had nothing to do with how I looked.

“Wow, I really knocked that presentation out of the park today!”

“I was a really good listener when my friend needed me.”

“I’m proud of myself.”

Because once I stopped being so laser focused on my own personal appearance, I stopped paying attention to, caring about and commenting on anyone else’s.

“You handled that situation so well today even though I’m sure it was really challenging.”

“I thought your idea about how to ____ was brilliant!”

“I really enjoy working with you. You have such a positive attitude and it always brightens my day.”

Moving the needle on all of this stuff starts with us. It starts with you, and it starts with me. So I’ll just be over here reminding myself of all of this every day. Because I need to hear it every day. And if you do too, here’s your reminder for today. Maybe you can be the one to remind yourself tomorrow, and every day after that.