This post contains photos of my pregnant body. This has been hard for me to share, but it would be hyprocritical of me to tell you all to love your bodies… and not love my own. Please be kind!

I love seeing bump pics. Yay for all you proud preggos getting your bumps out in the world! But I have to admit, when I look at my own, I just don’t get that feeling.

I’ve never had that perfectly round, tight, line free baby bump and I have to admit, because of it, I have felt ashamed of my, what I have called in the past… franken-bump.

I do love my growing bump... when it's covered up.

See I’m not thin and my weight has gone up and down my whole life. In my first pregnancy I noticed that my bump started forming out of my pre-existing paunch… and it wasn't perfectly round. I was like “what the hell, isn’t this baby supposed to stretch me out into a beautiful spherical beach ball?!” Not me… this baby was just a big lump growing underneath my existing ones. As a result, I hid my belly as much as I could in my first pregnancy until I was REALLY pregnant. No figure-tight belly hugging dresses for me!

Don’t get me wrong, I loved being pregnant. I loved the whole experience. I just couldn’t love that my body didn’t look like the ones I saw on social media.

And now, in my second pregnancy, I find myself looking down at my stomach and once again feeling that same… it’s not shame anymore but maybe a twinge of embarrassment? To me my belly area looks like a DEFLATED BALLOON that is slowly re-inflating… covered in stretchmarks and definitely-not-tight-skin. It bears the marks of the ghost of pregnancy’s past.

But you know what? F*CK that. This is very likely going to be my last pregnancy (we think 2 is our magic number) and I don’t want to go through another pregnancy being ashamed of my body that is doing something MIRACULOUS. So I’m forcing myself to flip the switch. I’m pep-talking myself like I pep talk every other woman out there to love and embrace their body. I’m doing it.

Learning to love my unique bump. Being really brave going with no filter here guys, but come on... I'M GROWING A HUMAN IN THERE!

So this is me. Behold my slowly reinflating, stretchmark covered franken-bump. And you know what. I’m proud of me. I’m a bloody goddess. My pregnant belly is beautiful. I grow life and I bring it into this world.

At TMM we talk a lot about body positivity and I think there is a lot of love and posts out there about embracing and appreciating the postpartum body. But I think we need to work on normalising pregnant bodies that don’t fit that “fit and flawless” image. And I want to explicitly say there is nothing wrong with women who are fit and flawless. Nothing wrong with a perfectly round and line-free belly.

We just need to build the confidence and visibility of a wider range of pregnant bodies. Because I want other women out there, who might be like me, to feel proud of their bump. Trust me, you’ll regret not having photos of it once your baby is born.

So I’m loving my bump, no matter what it looks like, I’d love it if you did the same.

Bron x