Welcome to Fit'N'Feisty BELLY BLOG!! :)

Pregnancy is a beautiful time, we are growing a human being, a part of ourselves, of our very own heart and soul. As a third-time pregnant mom with an obsession with pregnancy message boards and an endless supply of my own personal struggle I can confidently say that many, many women truly struggle within.

It's not easy to gain weight when you've always fought against it. It's not easy to accept some loss of control over where the weight goes, how far your hips spread or how many stripes we earn. In fact, it's downright devastating and terrifying. Yeah, sure we have to be strong and proud right? After all, we're creating and beautiful being and complaining would just make us selfish, right? I've heard it all before from friends and strangers abroad. The theme for most? It is a huge struggle that sometimes will last for many years to come.

There are a wide range of NORMAL emotions women go through. Imagine, if you've never experienced pregnancy yourself, living in a world that puts a great deal of focus and emphasis on body appearance. A place where increasing weights is associated with an equally increasing number of negative presumptions. Imagine being flaunted dozens of images of pregnant celebrities never lacking a supply of judgements about their increasing weight, praise for losing impossibly quickly and never-ending "tips" on how YOU should be able to do it, too. Now imagine some of the emotions you might feel gaining 30-80+ pounds in a brief 9 months while watching your once familiar body transform into something completely new and unrecognizeable. For some, the belly is worn with pride, for some it carries the fear of losing themselves forever. We all experience this beautiful, terrifying phenomenon differently.

So here it is, join me on my journey to getting purposely large and the struggles that come with a history of disordered eating and too much focus on the numbers of the scale. I won't be preaching about how easy it is to stay fit and eat healthy and I won't be staying in my current clothes (in fact, at 8 weeks I've already long outgrown anything with buttons around the midsection) and all the craziness that comes along with it a surprise #3.

It's not always going to be beautiful and perfect but this is MY journey, my never-ending journey to inner health and balance, NOT public "ideals"