Every Way (Brush of Love 4)

But I hated myself whenever I looked into a mirror.

I knew I needed to be gentler on myself. After all, I was growing a child. But I felt my body wasn’t mine anymore. I looked at my hair that was steadily growing back, the brown hair I’d known throughout my childhood. I didn’t feel like a brunette. I felt like a wild, spicy redhead. But with all the chemicals in hair dyes, I was advised by my doctor against using them.

And that was before I looked into a mirror.

Whenever I stood in front of a mirror, the only thing I could do was take stock of how my body was changing. My thighs were larger and ricocheting with light stretch marks. My stomach was split in half by a darkened line as my belly button protruded from my body. My arms were bigger than ever, and my feet were spreading so much, I had to buy all new shoes along with all new clothes the bigger I became. My cheeks were rounder and redder, and there were angry purple stretch marks that cascaded down my stomach. None of my clothes fit properly, and I had grown to a point where Bryan could no longer fully wrap his arms around me.

Every time I looked in a mirror, I became a bit more depressed. I had watched the cancer treatment rob me of the curves of my body, and now I was watching this pregnancy grow my curves to points I’d never wanted them to reach. And I loved this baby. This baby was proof that I had survived, that I could live a normal life, that even with all of the turmoil Bryan and I had gone through, we could still create a beautiful life with one another.

But I was seven months pregnant, and I had never felt more unattractive in my life.

No matter how many times Bryan declared I was beautiful and no matter how many times he made love to me, I still felt unattractive. No matter how many times people doted on how well I was carrying my weight and how radiant my face looked, I still felt unattractive. Every time I woke up and stood in front of the mirror, trying to piece myself together, I saw some new thing about me that was changing, a new fat roll that had popped up or a new stretch mark that had burst onto the scene. I was an everchanging sculpture that was being carved by a madman. I was a painting slowly dripping in the rain after not having properly dried. Now, the evidence of my exhaustion was on my face. I could hit a point in my pregnancy where heartburn was waking me up and getting up to go to the bathroom was its own abdominal workout. There were bags tugging at the bottom of my eyes and rings that were beginning to form, darkened rings that cast a shadow over the entirety of my face.

And I couldn't even have caffeine because I was pregnant.

Peeling myself from Bryan's arms, I allowed the sunlight to drench my face. We had just gotten back from my European art tour a couple of weeks ago, and we were still settling in. I busied myself at home with painting the nursery before I decided to go back to work, but each day I woke up became a little harder than the last. If it wasn't the heartburn or the constant need to pee that was keeping me up, it was the fact that our child was pummeling my insides and using my kidney and liver as a punching bag while I try to prop myself up to get it to stop.

Needless to say, I was not one of those women who enjoyed being pregnant.

I slid from the bed and slowly made my way to the bathroom. I knew I was about to start my morning ritual with picking apart every little detail that had changed overnight. I saw it as I turned on the light, rubbing my hand over my aching stomach. My skin was stretching to points I didn't understand were possible, and as my eyes adjusted to the light beaming through the bathroom, I thanked my stars it was Saturday.

I reached for the lotion and began to rub it all along my stomach. It was supposed to help with the stretch marks, but I came to figure out that it was simply false advertising. But still, the skin on my stomach was so dry, it was now beginning to flake.

Another change for a body that was falling apart.

I rubbed lotion on my stomach and then ran it up my chest. My breasts were so full of milk, they were beginning to leak. They were drenching the front of my shirts during the night and forcing me out of bed to change my outfit. Laundry had become a bigger task than ever because I could no longer bend over the dryer in order to pull things out. Bryan was now having to help me with things I never needed help with before, like putting on my socks or getting out of bed or picking things up from the damn floor.

It wasn't just how this pregnancy was changing my body. It was how it had rendered me useless.

“Knock, knock.”

It wasn't until Bryan

had knocked on the bathroom door that I realized tears had sprung to my eyes. I rubbed the last of the lotion into my bosom and then walked over to the shower to turn it on. I tried to shield myself from him until I could get my tears to go away, but instead of taking the hint that I wanted to be alone, he came in and shut the door.

“Hailey, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” I said, sniffling. “Just a bit tired.”

“Did you not sleep well?” he asked.

“I never sleep well anymore.”

I snapped at him more than I should have and sighed. I turned my reddened face to him and allowed him to see the tears dripping down my face. Bryan’s state of shock turned to panic, and he quickly strode over to me and gathered me into his arms.

Well, he gathered up what part of me he could hold.

“What happened?” Bryan asked. “Talk to me.”

“I just want to take a shower,” I said.

“Then we’ll talk in the shower.”

I stepped into the warm stream of water and allowed it to rush down my back. I could hear Bryan's clothes dropping to the floor as he undressed. The warmth of the shower wrapped around my body, relaxing me as Bryan stepped in and closed the shower door. His arms threaded around my stomach, cradling what he could in the palm of his hand as I pressed my back into him.

“Talk to me,” he said. “Please.”

“This pregnancy is just getting hard,” I said.