Fake it until you make it | Body confidence with a stoma

Fake it, until you make it

My body confidence has taken a battering since October last year, I have had a quick influx of weight gain, Two stone to be precise and its all being caused by my buddy the inclusion cyst, which has grown by another 10 cms since my scans in August of last year. 

This has made life difficult for me as I am currently restricted by choices of clothing. Jeans are difficult due to the pain it causes with the cyst. I also do not like my reflection in the mirror. 

You may have seen that I recently took part in a photo shoot with Pelican, Eakin and Respond. You may see a happy smiling Louise, but I will be honest, I was absolutely petrified because my body has changed that much due to something out of my control that I do not recognise myself in the mirror or on camera. 

At the moment I am having to dress myself to hide the cyst as I look pregnant on one side and it really protrudes out and I find myself having to tuck myself into my trousers. 

I am so looking forward to having the cyst removed as the vain part is telling me that once removed I will snap back down to my normal weight, where as the logical part of me is absolutely petrified as I have been told its risky and dangerous. However I can not keep living my life on pain meds and in pain all the time. 

I was going swimming on a Thursday with my cousin, and I got some special swim shorts to cover me up so I didn’t have to worry about people staring at me. 

I am currently housebound on bedrest apart from trips to the hospital and my work commitments with Pelican for our new podcast, beyond the Pouch. I am living in Pjs and leggings at the moment and can’t wait to at some point get back to my normal. The blip with my confidence will rectify once I am pain and cyst free.

My body confidence prior to the cyst

I have started getting better over the years, shock horror, I now wear shorts, since the balloon style shorts come out, I find them easier to wear, I use a large stoma bag so short shorts are not ideal as my outlet pokes out of my left leg hole… it also occasionally digs into my thigh, yes I could use the smaller bags but they are not equipped to deal with my output. 

Body confidence is such a fickle thing, considering myself more or less normal with an added bonus of a ileostomy that has a bag attached to catch the waste, does this make me less able to flash my midriff or does this give me a purpose of educating and highlighting what so many of us hide underneath clothes. Clothing on can hide a multitude of sins and also hides the ostomy.

Are we right to be afraid and less likely to show the bag or is it a case of flaunting what we have to and to hell with the general consensus of you can only show the perfect body? 

We all have those small imperfections. Mine is a mass of stretch marks and some rather epic scarring. Pre ambassador and advocating stoma life I was always reluctant to bare it all and always considered myself not worth being stared at due to my scars.  Most of my body confidence has now come from the fact I have hit a happy place with my weight and with my body shape. 

My end thoughts

For me my ostomy doesn’t bother me, it’s the stretch marks and lack of stomach muscles. I have mesh holding in my innards so regardless of how fit and healthy I am, my stomach is still slightly rounded and rather solid thanks to scar tissue. 

Body image is unique to each of us. We all have our own neurosis. There is no right or wrong way with stoma life. You can flaunt it and show off your life saving, life improving device or you can keep covered. It is down to how you want to live life and how you feel about your stoma. 

As always

Many thanks for reading 

Louise | @crohnsfighting Xx