Hello dear Happy Eaters!
I don’t know whether some of you remember me, but I was active on this forum a few years ago.
It helped me find balance and I was in a really good place with food (no restrictions/ no obsession/ no binges) and exercise (barely any exercise) for years!
Everything was going well, I got marrie in September 2021 and a few weeks later I got pregnant. We were super happy! But then, the pregnancy started messing with my head. I started gaining weight despite eating to my hunger cues as usual and it freaked me out! It was like I could not trust my body anymore. Clothes started feeling tight and my body image went downhill as my belly started growing.
I am currently 7 months in (due at the end of May) and it’s getting harder and harder to accept myself with this huge belly. I also went back to weighing myself every couple of days and the number on the scale keeps going up, up, up (obviously).
I want to be 100% transparent: I have not gained that much weight objectively (5-6kg in 7 months, which I think is like 11-13 lbs). My gynecologist keeps telling me that I could be gaining more and it would still be really healthy. I was also thin (not underweight but slim) to begin with so maybe I’m supposed to gain more. I am not restricting per se, in that I always eat something if I‘m hungry because I don’t want the baby to suffer from my craziness, but I am definitely focusing a lot more on what I eat and also not really allowing myself as many “fun foods“ as I was before.
So I guess I was not as much of a “happy eater” as I thought! Or rather, I was a happy eater because I was still maintaining a figure that I liked.
So this brings me here: is there anyone who experienced something similar during pregnancy? I know I should not be focusing on my body but I can’t help it. I am afraid to look at myself in the mirror and I can seem to find a way to accept this new body
Just a little update! I am no longer pregnant. I had an emergency c-section on May 10 because of pre-eclampsia. Our son is perfectly healthy thank goodness! Then I had a second surgery on May 11 because of internal bleeding, and a third operation on May 12 it was still bleeding (because of the anti-coagulants I take since a carotid problem I had in 2020). The 3 surgeries in 36 hours (2 of which under general anesthesia) have really taken a toll on my body. I was in so much pain, couldn’t walk/ sit up/ stand… My whole body was falling apart: low hemoglobin, anemia, not holding on to fluids, horrible stomach pain and gas, pressure sore at my coccyx from laying on my back… Nothing worked anymore basically. Also, my breast milk didn’t come (or at least not in sufficient quantities to feed my baby). It’s now been a week since my third surgery and I am finally feeling a bit better. This whole experience has reminded me of how important health is above looks. I love to look slim, but it’s really nothing if I am unhealthy. I lost all of my pregnancy weight and even more (went from 56kg to 47kg in 9 days!). I look and feel like a ghost. So for the past few days I have been eating everything they give me at the clinic, including carbs and dessert. I eat everything that is on my tray, period. I really think I can use the extra food right now so I don’t even let myself question it with thoughts of “am I still hungry?” or “do I really want this?” Before I got pregnant I thought I had found food freedom and that I didn’t have any fear foods anymore. This is true, but I now realize that I still have one big fear : eating “too much”. I would allow myself to have whatever I wanted but always smallish quantities. Also, I was *never* allowing myself to eat if I wasn’t hungry, just because something sounded good. So now I really want to focus on 1) healing my body 2) letting myself eat more and 3) allowing myself to eat because of the experience sometimes. Like on my birthday (May 14 - I was still at the clinic) my mom brought me cake. I didn’t eat it in front of her - even though I knew she would have loved to see me eat it - because I wasn’t hungry. I kept it for after dinner because I was hungry then. I want to be able to eat birthday cake when I’m not hungry. I think it’s something that most people do so why can’t I? I think I might start a new journal on here so that I can continue on this journey and hold myself accountable not to go back to my old ways.