Pregorexia and Other Thoughts

One would think that I would have plenty of time to spend blogging with the "not working" and all, but organizing my life in two-hour chunks is way more difficult than I thought. But today, there is naptime, sweet naptime. So I can post links to all the interesting articles I've been reading (note: I do most of my reading on the blackberry during middle of the night feedings. Breastfeeders seem to be an untapped market for mobile device makers).

First, I read this response over at We Are The Real Deal to Maggie Baumann's essay on pregorexia. If you're not scouring the Internets daily like I am, the back story is that Baumann talked about suffering from an eating disorder during both of her pregnancies and then was thoroughly annihilated in the blogosphere. I do wish Baumann had gotten some help for herself, but I'm really put off by the backlash. Here's the bit I couldn't have said better:

"The truth is that millions of women suffer from eating disorders and the majority of American women struggle with some form of disordered eating–from chronic dieting to compulsive exercise to secret eating. Most of us know firsthand what it means to have food and weight issues. Why should we expect that those issues will just magically disappear during the most body and life transforming (not to mention stressful) times in our lives, aka pregnancy and new motherhood? There are mothers who have full-blown eating disorders and pregnant women who shed tears over their changing lives and changing bodies. There are women who look at pictures of celebrity new moms in their bikinis and feel desperately unhappy in their own skin and women who are terrified of passing their poor body image on to their children. These are all vulnerabilities that have the potential to unite us. "

Before I got pregnant, I assumed pregnancy would be such a relief because it would be the first time in my life that I wouldn't have to obsess about my weight. Ha ha ha. And then reality and an actual pregnancy hit. While I did eat what I wanted for the first time in a long time, the obsession didn't magically disappear. Sometimes it was actually worse, thanks to the doctors who were telling me that I was either gaining too fast or too slow depending on the visit. I was not only obsessing about my weight, but it became more loaded because I thought I might be harming my kid if I got too fat or too skinny. One conversation with my doctor went something like this:

Doc: You're putting on weight a little bit faster than we would like.
Me: But what can I do about it? I go to the gym every day and I'm only eating a few extra calories.
Doc: Well, at this point, you can cut out the extra calories. You might also want to cut out sweets and carbs.
Me: I thought I wasn't supposed to diet during pregnancy?
Doc: Well, that's not a diet. It's eating healthy.

Yeah, okay, I get that, but I still contend that all the obsessing about my weight gain and the related stress was much worse for Zygote than ice cream or my Chipotle habit.

The kicker? I was told -- while waiting to have my C-section after my prior 30 hours of labor -- that one of the best things I could do to avoid another C-section would be to get myself down to a healthy weight.

Folks, I gained 33 pounds during pregnancy. That's within the guidelines. Prior to pregnancy, I wore a size 12 which is about average. And then I lost all that weight within 6 weeks. I am woefully average.

And now, I am still obsessing. I wonder when I'll have the time to exercise, what it will be like to wear "work" clothes again, how to eat enough fruit and vegetables so that Zygote will get what she needs, how we're going to cook healthy food for our kids when we both work, etc. I am not Maggie Baumann, but I certainly have my share of disordered thoughts. I think I'm pretty average there too.