I'm trying not to overreact but I'm not sure if I should react or not.

[PelvicFlora]

I've had a lovely Mother's Day weekend. DH gave me a card from him and also from the kids, bought a bottle of champagne, we went to one of my favourite places for brunch. He's been great, and usually is great the rest of the time as well. Maybe a bit too fond of leaving his dirty socks on the floor on his side of the bed, but otherwise generally pulls his weight domestically and is a good egg.

I'm giving all that as background because I really don't know what to think of what he just said to me. I was jokingly telling him that he was sorting dinner tonight because I was going to be sitting on the sofa thinking about all the times I destroyed my body carrying children and giving birth. And then he said to me, 'you could do something about your stomach you know' (with a helpful face). So I was like 'do you think I should?!' and he said 'yes'.

I was really hurt. I'm a size ten and can still fit into jeans I owned before I had any kids. DC1 was absolutely enormous (DC2 was still enormous but less enormous than DC1) and my skin is stretched so much that it will always be wobbly and loose - no amount of exercising or pilates will ever make it go away. I'll always have a 'mum tum' because of the baggy skin.

I also had a terrible birth and massive tear with DC1. It was a 3C tear, if anyone knows what that means, then you know. I was lucky not be left incontinent. But even so, I had to have corrective surgery to try and repair everything when DC2 was 8 months old.

All of that is to say that my body has really been put through it and despite all that, I still rate myself. I'm privately a bit sensitive about my tummy but most of the time I think 'fuck it', it's not like I was ever a supermodel or anything. Who/what do I need to have a perfect flat stomach for?

But what DH said really stung. I'm surprised by how hurt I am and I feel a bit humiliated. I said 'oh I hadn't realised you secretly thought I was a fat cow', and then left the room because I didn't want to cry in front of his stupid 'I'm only trying to help' face.

He likes to keep fit himself and is in good shape but I never had him pegged as a shallow twat. He's very focussed on health but has never been bothered about looks (or so I thought).

AIBU to be upset or am I being too emotional?

What are you on about? Where did I say he should be strung up?

See I wouldn’t have booked the Pilates. You’ve just confirmed to him that exercise will fix this when you said it wouldn’t (not yet anyway). Did you explain amongst your tears how badly your body had been affected by childbirth. I really think you need to or this will fester.

Oh just stop being twats, people. 🙄
Not a time and place if you bother reading OP's post and not just do tit for tat about MRA

This ^

Just don't drop your phone @PelvicFlora ! 😅

As for you @Ktime just admit that you now look very foolish... doubt it though.

You didnt, I didn’t say you did, do you have problems reading? You are clearly just talking crap to wind up @7eleven

Stop it. You’re embarrassing yourself now. Anyway. I’ll say no more. Don’t want to derail the thread.

Enjoy your bath OP and I hope this stimulates a useful way forward for your health.

You and 7eleven do love insults about reading. Have at it.

Hallelujah, I never wanted to respond to you in the first place.

I think he thinks it can be sorted by doing 100 sit ups a day. I've told him so many times that because I've had a prolapse and rectocele repair surgery, sit ups are the worst thing I could do. But I always get the impression he thinks I'm being precious and could do sit ups if I really wanted to but am using the surgery as an excuse. Same with my not running.

Tell him if he thinks he knows better than your surgeon and your physio he is very welcome to go and argue it out with them.

No...grown women who have probably drunk a glass of wine or two giving awful advice over what is probably a miscommunication.
High school level bs.
OP talk to your partner,clarify with him and resolve it together.

He might be fundamentally kind and even well-intentioned, but a little bit ignorant about what is actually involved in childbearing and birth. If that is the case, the idea to have your physio describe your birth injuries to him might open his eyes a little bit, if that is not something that would put you off.

But, it also sounds as though you have already done exactly the right thing by booking your Pilates and telling him how you feel, and maybe he will understand you a little bit better even if you do nothing else than what you have already done.

Hi OP, I haven’t RTFT - just your posts. I just wanted to say that you sound like such a lovely person. I have one DC and can only hope that in a few years time I have the healthy, grateful, joyful outlook that you have about your body and your life, despite the challenges, including losing your mum.

Please don’t let one clumsy comment from what sounds like an otherwise loving husband get into your head. It’s a sweeping generalisation, but men are so solution focused - it sounded to him like you were offering him a problem to solve, and he didn’t stop to consider the emotional implications of offering you a solution. And he wasn’t thinking about it as a problem from his perspective, but he thought it was a problem from your perspective. He should have known better and paused to think before speaking of course, but I very much doubt that it evidences him having been secretly judgemental about your stomach up until now. He says he’s mortified and fancies you - take him at his word and believe him.

Be kind to yourself xx

Agreed. My DH has a science degree - but I still had to spell out some of the impacts of childbirth to him and I can well imagine him saying ‘well, do some sit-ups then’ if I commented on a wobbly belly.

I also find that if you normally crack on with things men like mine just assume you’ll always be ok. In my case, mine has had to be reminded this weekend that just because I’ve coped fine for over 30 years with no mum doesn’t mean I’ll be fine with thoughtless comments.

Ahh thank you for your message. And to all the posters who have offered their perspectives. You've all really helped.

He's really grovelling now and I he knows he's really put his foot in his mouth. I also think he's panicking that he might never get a shag again!

The upside is the Pilates sessions are something I've wanted to do for a while but I was too tight to fork out for them out of my own spends. Now he's paying for it and can't argue, so I'll chalk that up as a win

I think I still feel really angry about how much my birth injuries have impacted my life and how it's all so minimised by the medical professionals as just something women have to put up with.

Fuck oooofffffffffff.

So DH's useless mansplaining about 'just exercising' off loose skin touched a sore spot for me.

I'm actually having a hospital procedure next week for something indirectly related to the birth injury (will it ever fucking end?), so I'm equally annoyed and anxious about that too.

It's obviously brought up a lot of strong emotions I didn't realise were so close to the surface. I'll be reflecting on this for a little while I think.

As lowkeyloopy says above, it sounds like he was offering a solution to what he thought was bothering you - and handled it clumsily. Sounds like he’s beginning to understand now.
Enjoy the champagne!

Well now you've simply confirmed to him that he was right, you just need exercise and have booked yourself in for some.

I was wondering how he could be so unintelligent as to not understand your birth injuries, but clearly inability to comprehend this is common as is demonstrated on this thread by posters many of whom seem to be women and so you'd think might have a bit more of an inkling. I should imagine if you are having more procedures relating to the birth injuries soon then a bit of pilates is just what you need

Seriously, I think counselling might help after all you've been through and not having your mum around etc., but to help with your own peace of mind, trauma and self esteem. Not to make you see how you need to change your body for your husband.

My dh says things like that to me every now & then. I'm a size 10 but I was a size 6/8 before dc2 so I know where he's coming from. I do not think my dh is dick for saying it. You should let yours know though if what he said upset you.

On the face of it. He's made a very hurtful comment.

But, to be fair and look more deeply. I think he's done, very clumsily, the same thing DH did to me.

I always complain about my stomach. Even when I'm at my smallest, it's wobbly and crappy.

Having heard me moan, daily, for 10 years, DH said about going to the gym for 6 months, and if I'm still not happy have surgery. When I asked if he thought I should, he also said yes.

Not yes, because he disliked my stomach. He couldn't care less. He thinks I'm beautiful, and fancies me rotten.

But yes, because he loves me. Wanted to show he supported me in doing anything i needed to be happy and confident in myself. Be that ignoring it (and shutting up about it, especially around the kids) or surgery. Whatever it takes.

So maybe, it wasn't meant in the way you took it? Though it's understandable why you took it that way.

Ignore my post. My app didn't load anything bar your first comment.

He's a dick.

Does a twat siren sound on Mother’s Day for all the quietly useful men to reveal themselves???

*useless!!!

OP have a hug.

FWIW I don't think it's birth trauma. I think it's upsetting because

• it's like he hasn't realised the impact of your medical experiences, which must be a shock for you
• It's like he thinks you can fix it and you should fix it, which is doubly infuriating because it shows he didn't fully understand what happened to you, but even if there's a surgical option, he'd think you should do it, even after all you've been through.

I would be furious and upset. I grew up as the sickly one in the family and it's partly that the others didn't go through much so they didn't understand, or they just bounced back really fast. Frankly, people who don't understand health problems piss me off. No one is asking them to take an exam, just to accept your experience.

The most extreme experience I had was a friend who didn't trouble to see how I was after an accident, because apparently getting a message from my sister saying "hospitalised with spinal injury" didn't strike her as a serious matter. It is amazing how thick some apparently intelligent people can be, so that side I get, I suppose he nedds to be told. But how awful that he doesn't already know.

Sorry, that was only helpful if you wanted someone to rant on your behalf...but, do you have any friends who can deliver some cold hard facts to him about this?

You sound hard work and a tad sensitive OP

@Arapawa what? Being upset about being told you should just work harder for a flat stomach when you had a prolapse and were and are at risk of incontinence = hard work and sensitive????

I seriously hope you haven't RTFT before posting that.

I don’t know if he was being awful or trying to be helpful, because it could be either way. Only you know.

But also I wouldn’t knock Pilates till you try it. I had a huge mum tum. Wasn’t overweight at all. Underweight if anything. I thought I had a bowel or bloating problem. Turns out was a pelvic tilt and abdominal weakness (not diastis).

Extremely common for the mum tum to be not weight but posture related. Same with the flailed rib cages and all other host of things women accept as normal after child birth. These are all reversible with the right physio. And no one ever talks about it!

For me it wasn’t about weight or looks, although it did bother me. I felt weak, I had pains and aches because my overall body was compensating which it’s very good at doing but will cause more and more problems as you go down the line.

You can test in the mirror. Stand super tall side on. Suck your belly button to your spine (not breathing in sucking stomach but more just engaging core muscles and bringing pelvic floor and ribs together rather than stomach). Hold it and tilt pelvis back and forth tucking and untucking tail bone. If it goes flat and when flat your front hip bones and back point pelvis bones align then it will actually be super easy to correct with a bit of postural awareness and some Pilates type excercises.