Jennifer Lopez gave birth to twins Emme and Max in 2008 and she recently admitted that she felt very “insecure and uncertain” in her body postpartum. This is both relatable and, in a way, shocking. Relatable because any woman who has given birth knows how much that experience changes everything in your life, including your body. Shocking because we’re talking about J.Lo here. J.Lo, the woman who has spent her life being extremely fit and radiating confidence. And yet, even she ended up feeling “insecure and uncertain” about her body after childbirth.
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Jennifer made this revelation while she was presenting the Daytime Beauty Award for Outstanding Achievement in Fitness to her friend and trainer Tracy Anderson. Jennifer reached out to Tracy after having the twins. She was trying to figure out how to get back to how she was before the pregnancy, but what Tracy helped her do was embrace the new version of herself.
Check out what Jennifer had to say about her postpartum body, how Tracy helped her both physically and mentally, and the key takeaway for us mere mortal moms.
This woman right here felt insecure after having babies!
None of us should feel insecure about our bodies ever. We should appreciate them at every stage of life, but easier said than done, right? Still, Jennifer has spent her entire career exuding confidence and embracing her body, which—let’s remember—was nowhere near the Hollywood standard of beauty or acceptability when she started. She was told to lose weight, that her but was too big, and so on.
She has stood strong and proud in an industry that wanted her to conform to their ideals of beauty.
“I got a lot of flak for it from people in the industry,” Jennifer told W Magazine, while reflecting on her early days in Hollywood. “They’d say, ‘You should lose a few pounds,’ or ‘You should do this or do that,’” she said. “It finally got to the point that I was like, ‘This is who I am. I’m shaped like this.’ Everybody I grew up with looked like that, and they were all beautiful to me. I didn’t see anything wrong with it.”
Even with that confidence and resolve, the physical journey to motherhood left her feeling some kind of way.
“I met Tracy right after I had my twins. I called her at a time when I was feeling insecure and uncertain, wondering if I would ever get back to how I was before—as most new moms do after giving birth,” she shared on October 1 at the Daytime Beauty Awards before presenting Tracy Anderson with the Outstanding Achievement in Fitness.
The thing is, why are women expected to go back to how they were before pregnancy?
“She came into my life and helped me embrace the new me and help me to be and to realize that I could be stronger than I ever had before,” the "Booty" singer said of Tracy. I so appreciate that Tracy wasn’t trying to help Jen get back to a past version of herself and instead encouraged her to embrace the new version of herself and move forward in strength.
What’s the takeaway here for us?
For me, it’s all about normalizing and accepting that our bodies will change throughout or lives, especially if we have kids. And we should not be striving to be like we once were, instead we should listen to Jen when she said: "I'm reminded of how much Tracy has inspired and encouraged me to celebrate every version of my body over the years, and to continue to elevate as my own life as needs changed."
