Post Baby Body

Roughly once a month I go on a diet/cleanse of sorts. Basically, for one week I commit myself to eating healthy and by this I mean, high protein, lots of veggies, low carb and no sweets. I eat three decent meals a day and a snack between each meal. This coupled with the fact that I try to exercise at least four times a week, it works and I have lost the baby weight easily. The thing is, when I was pregnant, I gained a lot of weight. Now, I had a big boy. But you can't blame nearly 50 pounds of weight gain on a 9 pound 3 ounce baby. What you can blame it on are the cookies, ice cream, endless bags of salty snacks and the gallons of milk I could consume in a single sitting. I was nervous as I neared the end of my pregnancy that 1. I would break the scale and 2. The weight would never come off.

As a stay at home mom now, I decided very soon after he was born that I would not let the aforementioned "number 2" happen. I had no excuse to not get up off my ass and do something physical during the day. Even if it just meant a walk around the block with my baby in tow. Admittedly, I do have my days where I just can't seem to peel my eyes away from bad daytime TV while my son sleeps, especially if there is a Real Housewives of New Jersey Marathon on or something. (I loves me some Manzos.) But seriously, I didn't let it number 2 happen.

There are parts of my body that are not the same as they used to be and quite frankly did not change for the better. For example, my muscle tone is basically non existent these days and my tummy has been replaced with a bowl of gelatin that is covered in fading stretchmarks. However, there are parts of my body that, dare I say it, I might even like better post pregnancy. For one, I weigh less today than I did before I got pregnant and this pleases me. And it seems the unbelievable widening of my stomach, ass and thighs may have actually put some things back in a better place than they were in before. I actually have some curves now. This makes me and the jeans I wear very happy as well.

In the past, my attempts to diet always failed because I liked food too much. Food makes me genuinely happy and not in a "food is not love" kind of way, okay? But, food excites me and I want to try it all. And sometimes that means things that are unhealthy. But I don't want to worry about eating that kind of stuff sometimes, because I truly believe in the very clique phrase, "everything in moderation." In fact, I think stressing yourself out about what you eat is likely more detrimental to your health than just eating a freaking piece of flourless chocolate cake or fried chicken once and a while.

But, I am getting older and things are quite bouncing back like they used to. Things are starting to "go out" on me, for example my back, my knees, my brain. And because I am aware of this, I exercise regularly and roughly once monthly, I diet/exercise/detox/get-really-sick-of-salad to stay on track and stay happy. Call it what you will, it works for me. I feel good about myself and I can eat the things I want once in a while without feeling guilty. Most importantly, when I do it this way, I am way less likely to cheat because I can do anything for 6 days. Right?

Well, accept this last go around but come on now, look at these things!



Trader Joe's is the devil. One giant, delicious devil.