Moms sick of hearing about the baby weight

December 8, 2022

Single mom Megan Carter is embracing the new curves she‘s gained around her bust and hips since she got pregnant with her son, Brody, now 18 months old.

But she doesn’t want to hear from others how great her body looks, how lucky she is to only have put on 20 pounds while pregnant and how her dieting efforts are fast melting the weight off.

“Don’t comment on my body at all,” Carter, 27, a part-time waitress from Houston, told The Post.

“People saying things like ‘You look great for having a baby’ might not be mean-spirited,” she said. “But it does have a negative affect on my body image and mental health.”

Carter is one of the thousands who’ve used the TikTok-trending #PostBabyBody hashtag to call for an end to postpartum body-praising. While the viral tag, which has amassed over 41.4 million views, is being employed by moms for various reasons, Carter and Co. are using it to say they’re sick of people making comments — even positive ones — about their physiques.

Megan Carter, a single mom of one, says compliments like "you look good for just having a baby" and "you're luck you only gained 20 pounds" have had a negative affect on her mental health. — Megan Carter, a single mom of one, says compliments like “You look good for having just had a baby” and “You’re luck you gained only 20 pounds” have had a negative effect on her mental health.

Carter says that she is embracing her extra pregnancy weight, but doesn't want other people to comment on her changing body. — Carter says that she is embracing her extra pregnancy weight, but doesn’t want other people to comment on her changing body.

“You look great … for just having a baby,” TikTok user Jaliya Davis says in a video, is a backhanded compliment. “Like thank you but no thanks,” she writes in the caption.

Chloe Ferrari, another postpartum mom on TikTok, revealed that someone rudely told her, “You look so good now that you’ve lost so much [pregnancy] weight.” She virtually blasted the unnamed critic for their thinly veiled barb.

Carter ultimately had to seek therapy after one too many nice-nasty comments.

Carter and other moms on both TikTok and Instagram are calling for an end to seemingly positive compliments to postpartum moms.

“One of my friends said something about my new weight, and I just remember snapping,” the brunette said. “I raised my voice, I was cursing. It was not a good situation.”

Connecting with a counselor has helped to diminish some of her postpartum anxieties, but she fears that the disguised niceties will be her perpetual burden to bear.

“As a new mom, there are so many things you have to get used to,” she said. “But my body image wasn’t something I struggled with until people kept bringing it up … Now I feel like [I’ll be subjected to] these comments forever.”

Carter suggested that rather than making mention of her changing form, folks talk about how well she is taking care of herself and the baby.

“I’m just a person trying to get used to my new body,” she said. “And the backhanded compliments don’t help.”