Have you seen my dress sense?

Before I became a Mum I used to think I had an ok sort of dress sense, I took pride in what I wore and although I was never a follower of fashion, I liked to think I wore my own version of the current trends. I knew what suited me and what didn’t and dressed myself accordingly but one thing I didn’t expect to happen when I gave birth to my daughter was that my sense of style would come out attached to the placenta and get thrown into the incinerator along with everything else.

For starters I had got so used to elasticated waists during pregnancy, I was reluctant to give them up (which is probably why I didn’t notice when my weight carried on creeping up). I decided that the smock tops from my maternity months could be just as useful post-birth at hiding the old Mummy tummy and hey, cotton pants weren’t so bad afterall – quite a lot comfier than lace if I’m honest and so you see already I had began to dress for comfort over style. During the winter months hoodies and jeans became the way of my wardrobe and something else to hide under.

After the birth of Beanie Boy I pretty much knew that my maternity days were over and it was perhaps time that I started to think about getting back some sort of shape to my body and so I was very lucky to be given the opportunity to take part in the Jenny Craig Weight Management programme and I did good, I lost 1 1/2 stone in weight and feel much better about my body now, yes I still have wobbly bits but with exercise I’m slowly starting to tighten them up. The problem that I have now is, I still can’t find my sense of style.

I am 35 but yet when I look at me in photographs I feel like I dress in a 40something’s clothes, which is fine if you are 40something but I’m not (yet!). On my various trips down to London I see women looking cool and quirky and think, ‘ooh I could wear that’ but when I try it I look ridiculous. I have bought a couple of new tops recently which I thought would look really cool and I’ve worn them but when I have looked back at photographs I think perhaps I looked in the wrong mirror before I left the house!!!

I feel a bit lost with my sense of style and I’m not sure how to find it again? Do I just sell off everything in my wardrobe and start again? What if I buy the wrong things? Am I alone or do we just lose our dress sense along with our brains when we give birth? Will it ever return?

Update: When trying to find pictures to add to this post from before motherhood I couldn’t find any where I thought I looked cool so perhaps I never had style in the first place!