I was in my closet today looking for my favorite pair of maternity jeans to pass on to my best friend, who is pregnant and starting to show. While doing this I made a shocking discovery- despite the fact that we have a nearly-full walk-in closet, I have no clothes. Now I know that most people say they have no clothes when they just can't find something to wear, but I really don't. For those of you who know me, or rather, my husband, it should come as no surprise that 87% of the closet is taken up with his shirts, slacks, ties and of course, shoes. (Granted size 13 shoes do take up a lot of room, but it doesn't account for the disproportionate use of space.)
Despite the fact that I have only lived in my house for 11 months, and we did a major purge of clothes before we moved it seems that my closet is primarily stocked with pants and zip-up hoodies from 1999. This is made even more unfortunate by the fact that this was the height of my thrift-store period.
As many of you have probably also experienced, my 20s were a time when I was on the move. During that decade, I think I lived in 9 different places. With each move, I would purge my closet of the clothes I no longer wore (dowdy counseling clothes anyone?) or wanted . But I managed to hold onto a few things that were comfy, and had begun to have some sentimental attachment.
During the last few years, i couldn't justify buying a lot of new clothes when I thought might be getting pregnant, at which point I would need to buy maternity clothes.
Of course once pregnant I only purchased enough clothes to get by during the pregnancy, as I would be back to my normal self in just a few short months. Those baggy pants got me through the first six months.
And then Raviv was born, and I didn't quite fit into the maternity clothes, but also didn't quite fit into my normal clothes. So I didn't buy anything thinking I would continue to lose weight. And I was happy to have baggy clothes since they did fit.
So here I am, 5 1/2 months after having a baby, rooting through my closet and I realize, there are few clothes that were manufactured after the 1999 baggy-era that fit. Now I'm wondering what to do- Should I go buy clothes that fit me now, knowing (hoping!) that I will lose the rest of my baby weight? I bought a pair of jeans a few weeks ago out of desperation, but now they are a bit too lose (a good thing for my ego, but not the wallet). And apparently low-rise is no longer an option without major crackage. What do I do about the fact that the brands/sizes that I knew worked on me no longer do? I think my ribcage is permanently expanded, my hips may never go back to their normal size and I have porn-worthy boobs (in size only). I currently do laundry every few days so I can wear the few things I have that fit and I like. Although the scale is moving in the right direction, I am mourning the fact that I will never fit into my skinny jeans again (new hips), or most of my favorite dresses (too tight for the ribcage).
Plus, even if I decided to purchase new clothes, shopping for clothes post-baby is cruel and unusual punishment. We don't have any full-length mirrors in our house so I was quite surprised when I looked into a three-way-mirror at the Gap and realized how much damage pregnancy can do to a body. Yes, it is amazing to give birth, create life from your own body and feed and nourish a living being and blah blah blah, but when confronted with stretch marks and florescent lighting, everything else seems to fade away.
My best solution would be for new moms to trade post-preg
nancy clothes. For those of you who aren't mothers, there is an amazing sense of generosity among us. Many of the clothes I wore while pregnant came from friends who had been pregnant before me. I am digging through my own closet to pass on to my friends who are newly pregnant. (I met a woman who had a pair of overalls that had been worn by 16 different pregnant women. When the baby was born, the mother would embroider the name and birth date of the baby onto the overalls and then pass them on). My proposal is that new moms trade the post-baby clothes. There should a new category of clothing marketed to this post-preggo population that can accommodate shrinking (not expanding) bodies. Maternity clothes are too stretched out to serve this purpose. I imagine lots of buckles, straps and velcro. Anyway, I guess baggy pants are better than mom jeans. (Again, that is not me in the picture)
nancy clothes. For those of you who aren't mothers, there is an amazing sense of generosity among us. Many of the clothes I wore while pregnant came from friends who had been pregnant before me. I am digging through my own closet to pass on to my friends who are newly pregnant. (I met a woman who had a pair of overalls that had been worn by 16 different pregnant women. When the baby was born, the mother would embroider the name and birth date of the baby onto the overalls and then pass them on). My proposal is that new moms trade the post-baby clothes. There should a new category of clothing marketed to this post-preggo population that can accommodate shrinking (not expanding) bodies. Maternity clothes are too stretched out to serve this purpose. I imagine lots of buckles, straps and velcro. Anyway, I guess baggy pants are better than mom jeans. (Again, that is not me in the picture)
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