To be pregnant is the greatest blessing in my life, and I will be forever grateful to have the opportunity to be a mother. With that said, I sometimes feel, as I’m sure we all have done, that my pregnancy is not a beautiful thing. I often dwell on how thin I was before I became pregnant and have a hard time finding myself still attractive.
To those of you who are having the same problems I found the following section from What To Expect When You’re Expecting: 2nd Edition the most helpful:
“In a society as obsessed with slenderness as ours, where those who can pinch an inch despair, the weight gain of pregnancy can easily become a source of depression. It shouldn’t. There’s an important difference between pounds added for no good reason (willpower gone astray) and pounds gained for the best and most beautiful reasons: your child and its support system growing inside you.
Yet in the eyes of many beholders, a pregnant woman isn’t just beautiful inside but outside as well. Many women and their husbands consider the rounded pregnant reflection to be the most lovely—and sensuous—of feminine shapes.
As long as you’re eating right and not exceeding the recommended limits for pregnancy weight gain, you needn’t feel fat—just pregnant. The added inches you’re seeing are all legitimate and will disappear soon after the baby is born (p 160).”