Is “Bouncing Back” as Fancy as It Looks?
“You will have your body back.”
“It is time that you begin exercising.”
“Oh, you do not look like you had a baby!”
These are the things that every new mother hears, and they have been camouflaged as flattery. However, behind it all, there is a more threatening kind of judgment postpartum weight stigma. Postpartum weight stigma defines the unfavorable attitude or discrimination against mothers due to their weight or the body in general after delivery. It may be influenced by doctors, family, social media, or even the mothers themselves.
The effects are not only emotional, but also highly physical, psychological, and systemic. Harm is done by the expectations. It allows taking the mind off of healing as well as putting emphasis on appearance. It is what is now known as postpartum weight stigma. And it may interfere with mental and physical health, and in a manner that is not always evident.
The Postpartum Body-Shaming
The ‘Snap Back’ Culture and Social Media Impact
Just a single look at a social media feed, and it becomes obvious. This brings a sort of silent race of whose body can take the least time to get back to shape before the pregnancy. Celebrities have had celebrity updates with toned abs a few weeks after delivery.
They take a caption that gives the impression that they are themselves or their clothes no longer fit them, followed by them fitting into old clothes. Such posts might appear to be motivating, yet they have also established a level that most people cannot achieve. The road to postpartum recovery is nonlinear. The body is yet to heal. Some muscles are adapting. Hormones are also variable. Putting this slower and more personal process in connection with edited content is putting too much pressure on it. It makes recovery a competition. Feeling failure, shame, or even panicking can be associated with such a race. Rather than taking an interest in health, a number of people start paying attention only to the reduction of their weight.
Medical Bias and Misinformation
The problem of weight stigma is not restricted to the sphere of social media. Other times, it can be seen in the places where recovery is supposed to be encouraged. It has been reported by some people that the doctors show a keen interest in their weight during postpartum, only during checkups than whether they are okay or whether they are healing. Discussions that can be concerning sleep, emotional health, or physical healing usually turn into discussions about figures on the scale. This kind of discrimination may be debilitating. It makes someone feel they are invisible. It conveys the idea that everything is more important than how they feel.
In other scenarios, patients do not attend follow-up visits due to fear of judgment. Due to this, the actual health problems can be ignored.
Mental and Physical Health Risks
Eating Disorders
An attempt to rebound by engaging in extreme forms of dieting, restricting or skipping meals, and rigorous exercises, most of the time when the body is not yet healed, is most likely the outcome. Such conduct may slow the process of healing, compromise the immune system, alter milk production, and even predispose to injury. Concerned with the look after giving birth, the priority can be granted to appearance even at the expense of real health.
Postpartum Depression
It is already an emotionally vulnerable time during the postpartum period. There are changes in hormones, identity, deprivation of sleep, and physical exhaustion. Then add the shame of body to that list, and it will make symptoms of postpartum depression and anxiety even more extreme.
Several studies established that individuals who undergo weight stigma following childbirth have higher chances of being socially isolated and mentally distressed. The thought of judgment with a judgmental attitude, particularly on one's body, can be disastrous, resulting in silence and pain.
Negligence In Medical Care
In other situations, individuals refuse to attend medical appointments or they forego support services, such as therapy or lactation counseling, due to the necessity to weigh in or the unwanted suggestion to lose weight. This type of avoidance may be hazardous. After-birth healing is a convoluted process, and foregoing it comes with foregoing assistance in anything, starting with tracking infection to emotional support.
Changing the Narrative Around Postpartum Weight Loss
Healing as Priority
The uterus alone depends on the post-pregnancy period, about six weeks before the size of that organ can be restored. But it is not only physical healing. It also entails mental and emotional changes, which are not guided by a specific schedule.
Just because you are not the first person to recover does not mean the game is over. The fact that a person has to be a certain way by a specific time is not just unrealistic; it is also detrimental. There is a need to change the perspective from the speed at which a given person loses weight to how they are healing in general.
Supportive questions sound like:
"How do you feel?"
"What do you want (now)?"
"Is there something I could do to help?"
Asking about the weight or the physical appearance does not help.
Need for Representation and Support
Digital media should be less constricted in its display of postpartum bodies and should be more natural. Stretch marks, soft bellies, and healing bellies are not flaws. They form part of an actual story.
Influencers, creators, and common users have the power to matter, expressing a better picture of what life after childbirth is like. This is real recovery, and it means good days and hard days and bodies that do not bounce but change.
And we can also be more conscious in terms of the language that we use in discussing postpartum experiences. It can make a world of a difference to allow presence and show understanding, instead of providing advice and criticism.
Digital media should be less constricted in its display of postpartum bodies and should be more natural. Stretch marks, soft bellies, and healing bellies are not flaws. They form part of an actual story.
Lifting the Weight of Judgment
What You Can Do- Things to Remember If You Are Online
Follow the accounts that use body acceptance and realistic recovery. It is also best not to consume the media that promotes detrimental beauty ideals. When you observe another one sharing his/her experience, do it with kindness but not paying attention to appearance.
If You Know a New Parent
Ask about their needs. Bring something to eat. Volunteer to take care of the baby so they can rest. Just appear rather than offer advice. The power of presence can be even greater than the attempts to repair something.
When You Are in Healthcare or Education
Learn about the fact that weight stigma is a health problem. The postpartum treatment must focus on the totality of a person and not only on the weight. Inquire about emotional well-being, sleep, and physical healing in the same manner that you would inquire about any other health issue.
Conclusion
The stigma of postpartum weight does not revolve only around body image. It is an issue of public health that influences recovery, mental wellbeing, and the way a person feels supported during one of the most life-changing periods of their life. It is our responsibility to be the way of talking about the needs of new parents to shift this discussion. What we should be asking instead of how fast they have bounced back is, How are they doing? Fertility rates necessitate that every mother needs time, care, and respect. Here is where we should stop waiting around till perfection and celebrate the process.
