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Celebrities put pressure on moms to lose baby weight
by Matt
Midland Reporter-Telegram
By Beth Teitell
The Boston Globe
There's no official deadline, but one thing's clear: She gets less time than she used to, thanks to standards set by a new crop of celebri-moms like Jennifer Lopez, who give birth one day and seem to appear on the red carpet the next -- rested, radiant, and toned.
Although it's difficult to recall, post-partum pudginess was once a private matter, an issue between a woman, her doctor, and her jeans. But in an age in which People, Us Weekly and lesser gossip rags track the stars' post-pregnancy weight loss with a laser-like focus, the pressure on regular new moms to slim down starts in the maternity ward itself, while they're flipping through glowing articles about Hollywood weight-loss triumphs.
What woman would feel good reading a headline like this (from the Daily Mail): "New mum J-Lo loses 40 pounds in four weeks with aid of gruelling workouts." Or this, from Star magazine: "Wow! Body After Baby!" Does a new mom really need to know, as Star reported in April, that Nicole Richie is down to 98 pounds three months after birth! Or Christina Aguilera's at 115 two months after birth! Or Gretchen Mol is 115 pounds after five weeks!
All these glowing insta-weight-loss stories and gorgeous photos may be entertaining, but they also raise expectations for average women, most of whom don't have personal trainers, round-the-clock nannies, or chef-prepared healthy meals.
"You don't want to be compared to the stars," said Ami Cipolla, as she pushed her preschooler on a swing in a Brookline playground and kept an eye on her 4-month-old twins, sleeping in their stroller. "But it's a celebrity-driven world. Everyone's reading the gossip magazines and looking at the pictures."
Comparisons are unavoidable, she added, noting that both she and Lopez had twins this past winter. "She's on the cover of People magazine," she said. "What's (my) problem?"
Her problem? With all respect to Shakespeare, the fault lies not within ourselves, but in our stars. As Meredith Michaels, co-author of "The Mommy Myth: The Idealization of Motherhood and How It Has Undermined All Women," points out, the pressure is "insidious" to slim down as fast as the celebrities do.
The message of perfection, she explained, "creeps into your consciousness and becomes kind of a gold standard. You know that you can't reach it. You know that you can't live your life that way, but the fact that somebody does creates this sense of envy and failure and resentment."
It also leads to an endless feeling of the need to be "hot," added Michaels, a research associate in the philosophy department at Smith College. "You're supposed to be hot no matter what," she said. "Hot before you get pregnant. Hot while you're pregnant, and you're supposed to be a hot mom. Maybe for like 24 hours after you give birth it's OK not to be hot for a minute, then you have to get back on the treadmill again to become a hot mom. That's your goal."
Perhaps no one's better positioned to see the increased pressure on new mothers to reclaim their pre-pregnancy bodies than Dr. Laura Riley, author of "You & Your Baby: Pregnancy," and medical director of labor and delivery at Massachusetts General Hospital.
"It's on every magazine cover now," she says of post-partum weight loss.
Riley recommends patients lose their weight in four months if they've gained the recommended 25 to 30 pounds during pregnancy. If an expectant mother gains 45, 55, or 65 pounds, "it's not coming off so fast," she says.
Four months would be an eternity in Hollywood terms, but in the real world it goes very fast, especially for mothers too stressed, exhausted, and busy with work and baby to hit the gym.
Which is why Heidi Murkoff, author of the best-selling book "What to Expect When You're Expecting," is more generous with her time frame. "It takes nine months to put it on, so if it takes nine months to take it off that's understandable," she says.
Emily Terry, co-author of the forthcoming "Postcards From the Bump: A Chick's Guide to Bonding With the Baby in Your Belly," goes even farther.
"You have until your baby is no longer a baby," she says. Asked how long that is, she hesitates, then points out that Baby Gap sells clothing for 5-year-olds.
Although there's no formal cut-off at which the so-called "baby weight" morphs into simply "weight," it happens to many women. Murkoff says the average mother keeps at least a couple of extra pounds as a "permanent memento" of each pregnancy.
That depressing little factoid was in the third edition of her book, she says, but not in the most recent, published in April. Murkoff decided to delete it.
"I took it out because it was a ('Saturday Night Live' character) Debbie Downer," she says. "There's no point in telling expectant moms that afterwards you'll be heavier. It's discouraging."
No one knows that better than Andrea Youman, the mother of a 1-year-old and a 3-year-old. Working two jobs and nursing her youngest have made weight loss all but impossible for the Newton woman, and her current plan is to wait until after her third child (if she and her husband decide to have one) to lose her excess 30 pounds. "It doesn't make sense to lose it just to gain it again," she said.
Unless, of course, you're a star bulking up to play the part of a woman who can't lose her weight. Then it's Oscar time.
The Boston Globe
There's no official deadline, but one thing's clear: She gets less time than she used to, thanks to standards set by a new crop of celebri-moms like Jennifer Lopez, who give birth one day and seem to appear on the red carpet the next -- rested, radiant, and toned.
Although it's difficult to recall, post-partum pudginess was once a private matter, an issue between a woman, her doctor, and her jeans. But in an age in which People, Us Weekly and lesser gossip rags track the stars' post-pregnancy weight loss with a laser-like focus, the pressure on regular new moms to slim down starts in the maternity ward itself, while they're flipping through glowing articles about Hollywood weight-loss triumphs.
What woman would feel good reading a headline like this (from the Daily Mail): "New mum J-Lo loses 40 pounds in four weeks with aid of gruelling workouts." Or this, from Star magazine: "Wow! Body After Baby!" Does a new mom really need to know, as Star reported in April, that Nicole Richie is down to 98 pounds three months after birth! Or Christina Aguilera's at 115 two months after birth! Or Gretchen Mol is 115 pounds after five weeks!
All these glowing insta-weight-loss stories and gorgeous photos may be entertaining, but they also raise expectations for average women, most of whom don't have personal trainers, round-the-clock nannies, or chef-prepared healthy meals.
"You don't want to be compared to the stars," said Ami Cipolla, as she pushed her preschooler on a swing in a Brookline playground and kept an eye on her 4-month-old twins, sleeping in their stroller. "But it's a celebrity-driven world. Everyone's reading the gossip magazines and looking at the pictures."
Comparisons are unavoidable, she added, noting that both she and Lopez had twins this past winter. "She's on the cover of People magazine," she said. "What's (my) problem?"
Her problem? With all respect to Shakespeare, the fault lies not within ourselves, but in our stars. As Meredith Michaels, co-author of "The Mommy Myth: The Idealization of Motherhood and How It Has Undermined All Women," points out, the pressure is "insidious" to slim down as fast as the celebrities do.
The message of perfection, she explained, "creeps into your consciousness and becomes kind of a gold standard. You know that you can't reach it. You know that you can't live your life that way, but the fact that somebody does creates this sense of envy and failure and resentment."
It also leads to an endless feeling of the need to be "hot," added Michaels, a research associate in the philosophy department at Smith College. "You're supposed to be hot no matter what," she said. "Hot before you get pregnant. Hot while you're pregnant, and you're supposed to be a hot mom. Maybe for like 24 hours after you give birth it's OK not to be hot for a minute, then you have to get back on the treadmill again to become a hot mom. That's your goal."
Perhaps no one's better positioned to see the increased pressure on new mothers to reclaim their pre-pregnancy bodies than Dr. Laura Riley, author of "You & Your Baby: Pregnancy," and medical director of labor and delivery at Massachusetts General Hospital.
"It's on every magazine cover now," she says of post-partum weight loss.
Riley recommends patients lose their weight in four months if they've gained the recommended 25 to 30 pounds during pregnancy. If an expectant mother gains 45, 55, or 65 pounds, "it's not coming off so fast," she says.
Four months would be an eternity in Hollywood terms, but in the real world it goes very fast, especially for mothers too stressed, exhausted, and busy with work and baby to hit the gym.
Which is why Heidi Murkoff, author of the best-selling book "What to Expect When You're Expecting," is more generous with her time frame. "It takes nine months to put it on, so if it takes nine months to take it off that's understandable," she says.
Emily Terry, co-author of the forthcoming "Postcards From the Bump: A Chick's Guide to Bonding With the Baby in Your Belly," goes even farther.
"You have until your baby is no longer a baby," she says. Asked how long that is, she hesitates, then points out that Baby Gap sells clothing for 5-year-olds.
Although there's no formal cut-off at which the so-called "baby weight" morphs into simply "weight," it happens to many women. Murkoff says the average mother keeps at least a couple of extra pounds as a "permanent memento" of each pregnancy.
That depressing little factoid was in the third edition of her book, she says, but not in the most recent, published in April. Murkoff decided to delete it.
"I took it out because it was a ('Saturday Night Live' character) Debbie Downer," she says. "There's no point in telling expectant moms that afterwards you'll be heavier. It's discouraging."
No one knows that better than Andrea Youman, the mother of a 1-year-old and a 3-year-old. Working two jobs and nursing her youngest have made weight loss all but impossible for the Newton woman, and her current plan is to wait until after her third child (if she and her husband decide to have one) to lose her excess 30 pounds. "It doesn't make sense to lose it just to gain it again," she said.
Unless, of course, you're a star bulking up to play the part of a woman who can't lose her weight. Then it's Oscar time.
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| Armed Forces News (for June 29) |
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George William Gockel wrote on Jun 29, 2008 3:58 PM: