After giving birth to twins, musician Alexa Wilding was offered a “mommy makeover” for her postpartum body. Months later, she realized just how harmful those two words can be for many mothers.
In a video for the “Dispelling Beauty Myths” series from Allure and StyleLikeU, Wilding opened up about the birth of her twins. She explained that after a year of nursing them and seeing one of them through a cancer battle, she struggled with having “that sensual feeling again.”
“I remember lying on my side to face my husband and the skin fell over,” she said in the video. “It was like a landslide. There was so much of it that it was me, my husband and this wad of flesh between us.”
Wilding described her experience with muscle diastasis, a condition some moms face after giving birth where the abdominal muscles separate, making it look like the mother is still pregnant. After having intense back pain, she visited a hernia specialist who suggested a plastic surgery doctor. The surgeon immediately said Wilding should have “the mommy makeover,” or a tummy tuck, a boob lift and “lots of lipo.” Wilding chose to only have the tummy tuck.
Later, Wilding began to recognize the pressures many mothers face to “fix” their bodies. After her tummy tuck, Wilding told the surgeon her skin looked different. The surgeon suggested she would have to go through the procedure again, and that’s when Wilding understood what was really happening.
“I was being sold this erasure,” she said, adding later, “It’s this maidenhood to motherhood transformation and we as a culture we want to stay in maidenhood as long as possible. So many women are trying to erase the rite of passage from their bodies, from their faces, their experiences.”
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