Alyssa Milano: 'I Love My C-Section Scar'

Alyssa Milano gets real about parenting and postpartum body positivity

“I love my C-section scar, because it’s where my babies came from,” Alyssa Milano was recently quoted as saying. It’s really refreshing to hear someone mention that little hidden scar that none of us ever talk about. And it’s a great way to think about it.

It’s so refreshing when moms are honest about their experiences with motherhood because it makes us feel like we’re not alone. Actress and mama of two Alyssa Milano opened up in a recent interview about the romantic image of motherhood we’re constantly fed and the pressure to lose the baby weight.

Milano shared with Today her message for those struggling with their postpartum weight. “Be kind to yourself and remember what your body is put on this earth to do, which is nurture, feed, take care of a child. Everything else is sort of irrelevant.”

She’s so right, what a boss. We’re not sure where the notion that moms have to lose baby weight five seconds after giving birth came into effect, but it’s hurting moms. It is completely absurd to expect a woman whose body has gone through pregnancy and childbirth to ‘bounce back.’ We’re forever changed physiologically and mentally mamas, we’re not bouncing back to anything. Some of us may never lose the weight and get back the tautness of our pre-baby selves and that’s OK. Some of us will lose the weight, but not right away.

Milano further exuded total postpartum body positivity with this message, “I do believe that the weight does come off in the right time. I really do. When I gave birth both times, I didn’t rush myself to lose the weight, but eventually it did come off. Sometimes it’s hard work, but to me, it took such a backseat to being a new mother and what that meant and how special and physically demanding that was alone.”

Preach sister, preach. Maybe we should as a society stop putting so much emphasis on losing the post-baby weight and encourage new moms to simply focus on taking care of their new little humans. Radical idea, we know.

Sarcasm aside, the actress and vocal advocate for the normalization of breastfeeding then praised her c-section scar by admitting that she loves it, because it’s where her babies came from.

I’m not going to lie. That one was a hard one for me. I had two c-sections back-to-back essentially and I struggled for several years hating mine. I saw it as jagged, messy, and very unsexy. With space and time I’ll admit I haven’t exactly embraced my scar, but I’ve definitely gotten over hating it. Part of that is because I’ve ditched the rose-colored image of what I thought my body and motherhood was supposed to look like. Being a mom isn’t always glamorous. Being a mom is hard. Milano said she wishes more people would talk about the challenges too.

“I think the media portrays this very romantic idea of being a mom and we see all these ladies on the white sheets loving their babies and they have on makeup and they look so pretty,” she said. “And there’s an element of it that’s romantic, but it’s a very small part. It’s a really, really hard job. And I think if more women were honest about that, it would help.”

Yes, that. It would help gazillions. Motherhood looks different for everyone, and as Milano points out, it’s not always pretty or perfect. New moms are so often trying to measure up to some illusive image that just isn’t there. It’s not real.

Kudos to Milano for helping us realize that.