Images: Sleeping Grace Photography @sleepinggrace
Olivia White is one of Australia’s most loved mummy bloggers. While raising her two young daughters she runs the hugely popular House of White where she shares the struggles, triumphs and every day realities of life with young children.
Fans of Olivia’s (yep, over here!) love her honesty and real approach to motherhood. Olivia ‘aint a show pony and that’s what makes her so relatable. What you see is what you get.
Last night Olivia cemented her place in our hearts after she uploaded a beautiful picture of herself celebrating her post baby body. In a timeline filled with “transformations” and “bounce back after baby” stories, Olivia’s post was different because instead of focusing our attention on women getting their bodies back to what they looked like before children, she instead chose to celebrate what her body had done in creating them. And it’s an amazing thing.
It’s undeniable that Olivia looks incredible, but her words are what we really need to focus on. In her post she shows a necessary respect for her body; it’s done some truly incredible things! She’s grown whole humans in there! Her boobs, as she says, were used to nourish her babies and let them thrive.
As mothers we face a lot of pressure to get back in shape after having babies, as though we are not allowed to have the aftermath bodies that indicate what we have been through. We are all on a quest to bounce back as soon as possible after the birth but the truth is you cannot always have the body you had before because you are not the person you were before. You’re a mother now. Your body created and nurtured your baby, from the time they were as tiny as a pin head, until they were ready for the world. Your breasts may no longer be as perky as they once were, that’s because of all the feeding; the late nights, the early mornings, the comfort and nourishment they provided to keep your babies fed and content. And yes, these things take their toll.
Images: Sleeping Grace Photography @sleepinggrace
We are left with stretch marks, saggy boobs, purple veins in legs, the list goes on. But instead of seeing these "imperfections" as such, we should instead look at them as battle scars, what we went through to get our babies safely into the world. We should wear them with pride. After three kids, I know I'm not rivalling Giselle for beach glances but who cares. My babies don't judge me on how I look and neither should I. Olivia posted a true representation of what most of us look like after babies and while our bodies may be different than before, they're still beautiful.
