Don't look in the mirror now, but ...

It's time for a confession that's perhaps just a little too much information.

I feel fat.

No, you haven't clicked the wrong link and gotten to the Weighing In blog (www.yorkblog.com/weigh), done by my friend Michele Canty. (If you haven't stopped in to check that one out, do. It's totally worth your time).

But I do feel fat. I'm in that awkward early-fourth-month stage, where I have a belly but it's not enough for people to be able to definitely tell it's a pregnant belly and not just an I-ate-too-much-for-lunch-again belly. And thanks to my overwhelming nerves during the first several weeks of the first trimester, I gained 10 pounds in, like, three weeks.

So this means there's just more of me to love, right? Screw that.

I haven't truly been happy with my weight since probably my freshman or sophomore year of college. I was OK with what I weighed around the time I got married, which was in 2001. When I got pregnant with Sam in 2002, I was a little less OK with my weight, but it wasn't as though I was pushing the too-big-for-my-height mark.

Now? Forget it.

I've basically been yo-yoing around with 10 or 15 pounds since I had Sam. Add in the tough spells I went through in dealing with the two babies we lost, and I'd have to say it's been waaaaaay less than pleasant trying to lose weight and keep it off.

I think I'll be all right once I really start getting a clear-cut pregnant belly, but for now, this sweet "thickening of my middle" phase is really making me cranky.

How did you deal with weight gain/loss during and after your pregnancies? Did you ever get back to your prepregnancy weight?