by The fourth trimester is ending, but the carnage continues.
Yesterday, I rode a bicycle for the first time since giving birth. It wasn’t far—just a ten-minute trip to the butcher shop—but it felt like a tiny triumph. I could sit on the seat. That simple, mundane fact would have been impossible six weeks ago. Then, even lowering myself into a chair required strategy. Pain. Bracing. Breath-holding.
Now, I can move a little more freely. But the truth is: my body is still nowhere near “back.”
Even that short bike ride? Technically outside my current walking radius. I could’ve done it, yes, but I would’ve paid the price. The trip would’ve required a bathroom stop halfway, and by the time I got home, my hips would’ve been radiating with ache—a deep, grinding soreness that feels older than me.
Last month, I tested my limits. I walked too far. Too confidently. And I wet myself on the way back. Completely. It wasn’t dramatic; no one noticed beneath the shelter of my long, thick skirt and the forgiving London rain. But it was humiliating in the way only private failures can be. My pelvic floor had issued a sharp reminder: you’re not healed, not yet.
The Silent Aftermath
There’s a strange betrayal in how little we talk about this part. The “fourth trimester” is often whispered about like a postscript—something hazy and tender, maybe difficult, but still manageable. No one says that it might feel like your body has been borrowed by someone else entirely.
I had thought birth would be the turning point, the beginning of my return to myself. After all, pregnancy itself was already exhausting enough to recover from. I thought once the baby arrived, I’d start climbing out of the fog. But what I didn’t realize was how birth doesn’t simply restart the clock — it resets it altogether.
I hadn’t accounted for the damage. For how birth would throw my starting line far behind where I had imagined. It wasn’t just sleep deprivation and leaky nipples and emotional chaos. It was a physical dismantling. Recovery isn’t linear. It’s not even always visible.
Tiny Triumphs, Lingering Wounds
There has been progress. In those first days postpartum, the entire area from my belly to my thighs felt alien. Numb. Detached. I could barely sense anything. My core had collapsed. My muscles refused to obey my mind. Standing up straight? A joke. Walking around the flat? A slow shuffle.
But then, gradually, some connections came back. A flicker of mind-muscle control. The ability to pee without bracing for pain. I could finally climb stairs without clinging to the railing.
Yet, even with progress, there are limitations. I still leak a little when I sneeze. My hips still throb if I overdo it. My clothes fit wrong — not just in size but in shape. My skin is loose in places I never considered. And my energy, that once-reliable resource, is no longer mine to command. I wake up tired. I sleep in bursts. I eat on the go.
The hardest part? I miss the version of myself that felt strong. In control. Capable.
More Than a Body
Motherhood rewires you. It doesn’t just reshape your body; it reshapes your identity. I’m learning, slowly, to be patient with the discomfort, to make room for the messiness of recovery.
Because the truth is, our culture prepares women for birth, but not for after. We glamorize the bump, celebrate the baby, and forget the woman who’s left to rebuild herself from the ground up.
This is the part no one prepared me for: the not-knowing. How long will this last? Will I ever feel fully myself again? What even is “myself” now?
A New Kind of Strength
For now, I’m counting the wins. Sitting on a bike seat. Laughing without pain. Making it through the day without a nap. Saying no to unrealistic expectations.
There’s power in acknowledging what’s still healing, just as there’s dignity in telling the truth of what this season really feels like. Not polished. Not perfect. But human.
The fourth trimester may be ending, but the transformation continues. And though I don’t yet feel whole, I know now: healing is not a return to who I was — it’s a becoming. One breath, one walk, one bike ride at a time.
