Skin After Pregnancy

There is just so much I can babble about diet and fitness...at the end you just gotta DO IT, STICK WITH IT, and LOSE IT.

Let's move on to the other issue the card of motherhood dealt you with. Beauty or the ruin of it, sob. Yes your figure is part of your beauty, but we are already taking care of that aren't we? The two things I will talk about here are freckles and stretch marks.

The moment I saw this picture when I Googled for stretch marks, because in no way am I gonna lay out my own stretchies here, I stopped completely complaining about my own. Mine are more on the sides and a couple underneath close to my pubic area. Unless you won the lottery in the genetics department, everyone and their mother will tell you that stretch marks are unpreventable.

You can considerably lessen them by gaining the recommended amount of weight during pregnancy (35-40 lbs, I think) and gaining it slowly. I used the Cocoa butters and applied it to the point of madness - it's supposed to help the skin's elasticity - but still in the last trimester, they popped up all purple and itchy. Like my friend's husband joked one time, "I wish I had so much money, I could buy a big tub of cocoa butter and just dip her in it."

I suppose over time they fade into a silvery streak, but they will always be there; they are a testament to the wonder of rearing a whole human being. But after I lose my weight, do you think these stretch marks will stop me from wearing a two-piece bikini? Oh hell NO! I'm gonna spread them out for the world to see, I'm sick of covering myself up. Having a baby and having your body pay for it is nothing to be ashamed of.
The other thing that pregnancy hormones do to you is grant you freckles if you had none before or increase and darken the ones you already have. I already had some freckles to start with but now, I find there's many more and they are darker than before. The shitty thing about discoloration of the skin is that it makes you look OLDER! Geez, I'm only 23 and I'm not ready to look old for another 100 years.

You just can't prevent this, I'm afraid to tell ya. The best thing you can do is use sunscreen whenever you go out so that you don't darken them even more. I thought that after I had the baby, maybe I'll go back to my old light specks but that hasn't happened yet. Nowadays, the beauty industry is cracking down on skin discoloration to help the millions of women in their fight against TIME.

There are creams, lotions, and such with a slight skin lightener infused with added doses of sunscreen. By God, get it if need be. I definitely am looking at a Shiseido one and probably that's what I will want for my first Mother's Day present. Hint *_* Hint Hubby! LOL, I know he's reading this.


Image credits: http://www.lionden.com/slides-skin.htm; http://www.thespiderawards.com; http://piratepapa.blogspot.com