I recently finished a book called "Bringing Up Bebe", written by an American journalist living in Paris with her British husband and three young children. It's about raising children in France, discussing the differences between American and French parenting, but there is a whole chapter about postpartum weight loss and Parisian style and how French mothers expect to regain their former "ligne" (figure) by three months postpartum. It's all tied in with the French attitude that women are not supposed to lose themselves to motherhood -- that being a mother and being a desirable woman are not mutually exclusive titles -- and of course there's the added fact that the vast majority of Parisian women return to work by three months (and there is plenty of affordable, high-quality child care that permits them to do so); whereas in America (and probably Canada, too), it's more acceptable for a woman to hang on to her baby weight for months or years after the baby is born, with the argument that we must always put the baby first and that regaining our "womanhood" can come later.
It got me thinking. How important is it to you to stay slim? And by slim, I mean at the lower end of your own healthy weight range, because we're all built differently and what's a healthy shape for one woman might be too lean or heavy for another. I won't lie. It's very important to me. I don't slave away to be thinner than my body wants to be, but I do get sweaty exercise for about three hours a week and I try to eat sensibly. I eat whatever I want, but I watch how *much* I put in my mouth. (I may or may not be raising my children in the French way, but I definitely eat the French way). And I don't just do these things to be physically healthy, although that is an added incentive. There's a big psychological component to it. If I'm honest with myself, the main reason I'm careful is because when I'm slim, I feel good. Confident. I can tackle life's problems much better when I feel trim and vigorous.
Perhaps I'm being super-shallow, but that's how it is. You?
