Does This Pregnancy Make Me Look Fat?

Does This Pregnancy Make Me Look Fat?: The Essential Guide to Loving Your Body Before and After Baby, written by my friend and colleague Claire Mysko and model Magali Amadei takes a walk through the psyche of pregnant women and address their feelings about their bodies.

Both Claire and Magali have personal experience with body image issues and eating disorders. In this book, they examine how women perceive their bodies as they become larger and watch the scale goes upward.

They also look at the unrealistic perfection of celebrity pregnancy features and actresses’ ubber-quick recovery and weight-loss might affect a normal new mom’s self esteem.

It also examines the odd phenomenon in which a mother’s body and her parenting choices involving her body become somewhat public space. Meaning, people who would never have intimately touched you before, strangers, bosses or neighbors, suddenly feel comfortable reaching out and stroking a pregnant stomach, criticizing a woman’s breast-feeding decision and exerting influence on medical issues such as epidurals. How does a woman adjust to her body being more public domain?

The book is full of fun and insightful anecdotes from real women talking about their changing feelings and very helpful steps women can take to make their pregnancy experience a positive one.