Emily's Mommy Makeover
My name is Emily, and I'm the mother of two beautiful, wonderful children. My son was born in 2000 and my sweet daughter joined the family in 2005. Like a lot of moms, I struggled with my weight and appearance after having children. While I had some pretty good luck using diet and exercise, I was unable to get my figure back. I breast-fed both of my children, and we all know what that does to our bodies.
I gained nearly 70 pounds when I was pregnant with my son. With my daughter, I didn't indulge quite as much, having learned the hard way that baby weight isn't easily shed. After both children, I was able to lose most of the weight, but my tummy and my breasts were never the same.
So... I decided to get a mommy makeover (tummy tuck and breast surgery). The crazy part wasn't that I decided to have plastic surgery. A lot of women do that. The crazy part was deciding to blog every step of the journey. You see, when I started doing my research, I found plenty of generic information about the surgeries, but what I couldn't find was a first hand account of the experience that covered both the medical details of the mommy makeover while also covering the emotional and social aspects. I found that talking to a girlfriend who had had the surgery was my best resource, but I only had one friend who had gone through the same surgery I was considering. Also, I thought, "What about those ladies who don't have a friend who's been through this?" So I made my decision. I would document my experience on the web for the whole wide world to see - start to finish - including pictures of my flabby body in a bathing suit! OMG did I really do that?!
Turns out EmilysMommyMakeover.com was a hit. Not only did my friends and family better understand what I was going through and support me through my plastic surgery, strangers from all over the world visited the blog and wrote me - often thanking me for my bravery and my candidness. They called me an inspiration and a role model. I'm not sure about that, but I am sure there is a need for this kind of info since even after a year of not blogging, the site was getting hundreds of visits ever single day.
That's when my husband recommended that we turn the blog into a book. He pointed out that the blog was out of order and cumbersome to read from start to finish. He said that converting into a book would make it a more pleasant read - and it could get in front of more people. I'll admit I liked the sound of that, but I was concerned that folks would see the move as one motivated by profit, rather than my original intention to educate women who needed a good source of information about the mommy makeover. Not to mention, publishing a book is expensive. So we settled on the "self-publish an e-book" route. This way, people can buy a digital copy of the book directly from our website, it'll get more exposure in online bookstores like Amazon.com and the Apple iBooks store, and best of all, we can keep it super-affordable AND give part of the proceeds to a worthy cause!
Emily's Mommy Makeover is now available as an e-book for only $4.99 and $2.00 of every purchase will be donated to breast cancer research! Everyone viewing this website can download a PDF version of the book to read on their home computer or laptop. Readers who have iPads, Kindles, Nooks and other mobile devices can download their versions too.
If you've come to this site looking for information about the mommy makeover, I encourage you to buy a copy of the book. You won't find another resource like this one... and you'll be helping with the fight against breast cancer.
Thanks so much,
Emily
