The Day My Daughter Taught Me to Love My Postpartum Figure

“Let’s promote beauty at every stage, every figure and every weight of motherhood. ”

— Sasha, The Mushy Mommy

It was a rainy afternoon and my girls were playing "family." They were pushing their baby dolls around in strollers and were being the sweetest little mommies ever. My four year old decided to announce that she had just had her baby. Since I just had a baby three months ago, my four year old has been pretending to "have a baby" a lot lately and it's nothing new to me. 

After she said that she had just had her baby, I asked, "Oh did you just come home from the hospital?" To which she replied, "Yes. I just had a baby and my belly is still big so I am going run." She then took off with her stroller running around the house. 

I laughed at first at her mimicking me. BUT then it hit me like a ton of bricks. I have completely done an injustice to my daughter. To all women. 

I completely distorted the idea of a woman's body after birth and at that moment, I knew I messed up. I prayed she would forget that unfortunate "lesson." I prayed I could show her how to love yourself no matter what. And that having a big belly after a baby is OKAY. 

Sadly I remembered the exact conversation we had when I was around 6-7 weeks postpartum and making them hop in the stroller to come jog with me. She had asked why I was running and I mistakenly said, "because mommy's belly is still big from having the baby and I want it to be small again." Or something along that line. When what I should have said was that I just wanted to be healthy or even, "I like the way I feel when I exercise." 

I look back now and can't believe that I did that. For someone who suffered with body images and food through high school, I look back and realize that could be the beginning of creating a misconception of how perfectly a woman must look and how soon she should "bounce" back. We see the magazines on the newsstands already about which celebrity had a baby three days ago and already has her six pack back; it's bad enough those headlines even exist for our daughters to one day see and compare themselves too. 

I'm embracing my womanly, motherly figure just as always. I know that with a few months of breastfeeding, some decent eating habits and a workout here and there when I can, I will reach goals. But I'd be lying if I didn't say that I don't have my sad days. Just like any woman I'm sure, I have days where I want to cry because none of my clothes fit. I have days of trying to hide my bare figure from my husband because I don't feel "perfect" enough for him and I have days of wanting to just eat any and everything so I can just be like "eff it." 

But what I learned from this unfortunate event, is to always remember that I am the role model for my daughters. I am setting the example of how they may seem themselves and their bodies one day. 

 I want my daughter to have her own child one day and look in the mirror with pride at her body and all that it is capable of. I never, ever, want her to think that she immediately has to diet or run the baby weight off. That's total bullshit. And lucky for me, I realize now how silly it was for me to even say that to begin with. Lesson learned.

So mamas, embrace your beautiful, motherly figure. Slowly try to attain the goals that you want, but remember that you JUST.HAD.A.BABY. And if you didn't just have your baby, I think we need to remember just how hard it is to sometimes fit in gym time and motherhood; the two don't go exactly hand in hand. Cut yourself some slack - us mamas have a habit of putting our children's needs before our own. It's what we do. 

So let's teach our daughters about living healthy, rather than trying to attain perfection. Let's teach them about embracing your body and loving yourself no matter what. Let's remind them that we are beautiful no matter what the scale says, no matter what stretch marks we bear and no matter how imperfectly perfect we are. We have to do our daughters justice and make an imperfect body image NORMAL in a time where teens and girls struggle daily to accept themselves. 

Let's promote healthy lifestyles, not perfect bodies. 

Let's promote beauty at every stage, every figure and every weight of motherhood. 

Cheers to all my postpartum mamas squeezing into pants that don't fit.

You're killing it, girl. 

Keeping Your Children Safe with KidGuard

This is a sponsored post because I believe in keeping our children safe, monitoring them and doing our best to be present in their digital world. 

Nearly every day we read or see something on the news of a child missing or kidnapped. It's scary how often we now hear about these things and having social media in front of us at all times makes it even worse because those news headlines stare at us as we scroll through our newsfeeds. 

Being a parent is hard, scary and worrisome. I don't think any mother can say that they don't worry about their child and I'm sure it's true that we worry even more when our child isn't in our own care. Whether our children are going to the movies with grandparents, hitting the arcade with school friends or browsing down aisle 3 in the grocery store while you're on aisle 23  - not having your child near you puts a fear in us no matter what. No matter how old they are, I'm sure that fear is there; the hope of safe return is always there. 

I was shocked recently to learn that majority of kidnaps are committed by a family member. Yes, you read that right. Granted sometimes these may be messy custody issues, but still...a kidnapping is a kidnapping. Approximately 203,000 kidnaps are committed by family members, 58,000 kidnaps are committed by close acquaintances and 115 kidnaps a year are committed by a stranger. That last number shocked me honestly since I just assumed MORE kidnappings were committed by strangers than that!

My four year old recently went to the movies with her grandmother and I decided it was a good time to really have the stranger danger talk. I had done this some before, but not quite as in depth. I told her a few key things 1) NEVER walk away from the person you are with just because someone calls you or says they have something to show you 2) A person who asks you to come get candy, go pet a kitty, etc...is trying to trick us 3) Always hold the hand of the person you are with 4) If someone is trying to take you scream and fight as LOUD as you can 5) If you get lost, find a mommy with kids or find a worker 

I then drilled her and asked her what she'd do in different scenarios to which she answered correctly each time. I felt better having this discussion and still bring it up when she is going somewhere without me or when we are going somewhere with lots of people. It scares me to death to think about the "what could happens..." 

I believe that speaking to your children at an early age is key to making sure that they understand the dangers that can take place any time, any place. I can sit here all day and talk about how we need to be mindful and not distracted as parents, but I think the majority of us know this. So instead, I thought I'd share some statistics to help you more aware of what's out there, how it happens and how to prevent it.

• Summer months, June-August, see the highest precent of kidnappings whether family or non family abductions
• 53% of abductions happened between 3:30pm - 10pm 
• 45% of abductions took place on a Friday or Saturday 
• Seasonal holidays have a slight increase in abductions
• Common lures for kidnapping include bribery, pretending to be in distress, pretending that the child's parent (YOU) are in trouble, name lures (stemming form monogramming bags and the like), animal lures, social media, gaming and authority figures (someone in a uniform)

It goes without saying that our time and era poses a whole new threat because of the digital age. For the longest we rarely posted photos of our children on our personal Facebook pages, but seriously, someone can find a photo anywhere I'm sure. However as a blogger and social media influencer, I do usually take off face photos of my kids that go on my public accounts or I watermark over their sweet, little faces. Please be mindful of your children and the Internet. Young and vulnerable minds are the perfect bait for the crazies out there!

Want to keep your kids safe? We all do. I think it is every parents main goal in life probably. I want to share this amazing site with you, KidGuard, where you can learn and read about SO many startling statistics, ways to prevent kidnappings and what to do should the unfortunate event arise. This site breaks it down to who to contact and how to work with authorities. I highly recommend bookmarking this page to use a reference should the event ever arise or even if you're traveling out of the country (there's some handy info on that as well!). 

What is KidGuard? Probably something that EVERY parent needs! KidGuard is the #1 call monitoring and cell phone/message/gps tracker. It's goal is to allow parents to keep an eye on what is going on in the virtual world of their children as well as providing a means to track a phone in the event that a child is missing. What I love about this is that cyber bullying scares the heck out of me. I have two young girls and I can only imagine who cruel kids may be by the time they are in school. Cyber bullying really scares me and I think a tool such as this is a great way to keep track of things on your young, adolescent teens that still need a parent's watchful eye over them. 

Source

Thanks so much for reading, and tell me...how do you speak to your little ones about stranger danger? Share your tips and advice below!

Gentle Reminders for the Mama Nursing a Newborn

When it comes to breastfeeding a newborn, it's hard. Like chemistry and calculus combined with running a mile in 90 degree heat, kinda hard. And just because it's your second or third go around, doesn't mean it isn't just as hard as before. The only good news about not being a rookie when it comes to breastfeeding is that you're not as scared and you're a little more experienced. However breastfeeding each different child can truly be different for so many. 

When it comes to breastfeeding your little one, there are a few great tips that can help you manage through those first few weeks. Nothing can totally prepare you, but search around on this blog and you should find some great resources! 

1. Feed on demand. As great as schedules are, you can't really think about that and you shouldn't because trying to schedule feeds too soon can result in decreased supply. Feed every 2-3 hours or when baby is fussy or appears hungry. In my home, a fussy newborn gets a boob. 
2. Feeding to sleep isn't a bad thing. Some books and people will preach that you shouldn't nurse a baby to sleep because then they will never learn to fall asleep on their own. But when you're tired and exhausting because, um newborn, sitting there rocking or trying to pat a baby to sleep is ridiculous. Nurse that baby to sleep and worry about the rest later. 
3. Hold off on the bottle and pacifier. I know those pacis are cute and all, but try to hold off about a week on those and about a month on a bottle. Sometimes babies become nipple confused and may prefer artificial nipples over natural ones. 
4. Eat, mama. Eat and drink up! I know (believe me I personally know) that when you have a baby you go through the stages of "give me all the food" and then you come home to weigh yourself and realize you lost like a pound during birth (WTH only a pound!!) so then you start planning all of the diets and you're more like, "hide all the food". Your body and your baby need for you to eat and drink. Sure you can make healthier choices, but don't skip meals. Poor nutrition leads to a poor milk supply and a grumpy mama! 
5. There's always milk. Don't freak out just because your baby is choosing to eat a lot or because your breasts suddenly feel like deflated balloons. There's milk in there! Babies cluster feed and hit growth spurts that rely on lots of extra nursing. Deflated boobs are a sign that your milk supply has regulated and is making just what your baby needs. While there are unfortunate cases of mothers who truly don't make enough or much milk, it is more rare to not make any milk; and low supply can often times see an increase with natural supplements and dietary changes. 
6. A pump isn't a great measure of what you make. Often times mamas will pumps gallons of milk in the beginning, even while nursing their baby throughout the day/night. Give it a few weeks and you're suddenly nursing all day and seeing much less during your pump sessions. This is okay because your body is likely just making what it needs to, rather than making excess milk. A pump is never a good measure of milk supply because a baby withdraws more milk in a feeding than a pump can in one session. And the science is weird, but the more your nurse during the day/night, the less you'll pump when you choose to. 
7. Take advice and don't take advice. There's SO much advice out there (like um eh, this blog post) and sometimes you don't know which way to go. The best thing you can ever do is listen to your instinct! I have also learned that people who didn't really nurse their babies at all or for a long period, don't often have the best advice. Grandmothers and older aunts sometimes have advice that now contradicts research. Just follow your instinct and turn to support groups on the internet, someone you know who successfully breastfed or your lactation consultants at the hospital or locally in your community. There's ALWAYS someone and there's almost always a solution! 
8. Remember that it does get better. For probably 90% of mamas who stick it out past those first six weeks, it does get better. It gets easier, it gets less painful and it all becomes worth it. Sometimes in the beginning when your boobs are hard as rocks and when your nipples are bloody and cracked, you begin to doubt that it is all worth it. But it is. It truly, truly is. The pain will go away, the random leaks should stop and your baby won't nurse all day long. It will become like second nature and you'll miss it the day it's gone (well maybe). 

Mamas, nursing a newborn isn't easy. It's sometimes the equivalent of what you can only imagine it would feel like to hook up jumper cables to your breasts. But it's also the equivalent of every joyful, loving and happy feeling you can imagine. If it isn't for you or if it doesn't work out, then be proud of what you did accomplish and know that it may (and should) be easier next time should you wish to try again. 

Nursing a newborn is a beautiful, wonderful and exhausting journey. But then again, that's really just motherhood summed up too. 

Thanks for reading and sharing, 

Sasha