On Leaving the House Looking Like a Homeless Woman

I distinctly remember the drive home from a babysitting gig at age fourteen when I noticed that the Mrs. Brown* hadn’t shaved above her knee.  Below the knee it was clearly shaven, but her thighs revealed fine blond hairs, shockingly long in my early teenage opinion. 

I remember being baffled and somewhat judgmental.  Why wouldn’t she shave the whole leg?  It takes an extra ninety seconds.  Could she really not have ninety seconds to spare?  And how is she ok with hairy thighs in the summer?  She’s wearing shorts.  People can see.

Fifteen years and two kids later…I totally get it.  To be fair, I probably stopped regularly shaving above the knee before I had kids, but now- let’s just say I only remember to shave the upper part of my legs when it starts looking like I have man thighs.  At fourteen the novelty of shaving my legs had not yet worn off and the embarrassment factor surrounding exposed hairy legs was high. 

Nowadays I sometimes marvel at what I look like when I leave the house.

It starts in college I think.  8am classes give way to the roll out of bed sweat suit look that I was incredibly fond of.  (And really, the multiple “sweat” items I owned emblazed with my sorority’s letters made it so, so easy to do.)  Post-college affords you a few years of career life where it is fun and exciting to get dressed for the work world (followed by some years where it’s not and you push the limits on “work appropriate sloppiness”).  And then, for me anyway, pregnancy and motherhood hits and it all goes to hell.  For the last three years I have been pregnant, post-partum, pregnant and post-partum again.  After Monster’s pregnancy I enjoyed about 5 months at my pre-preggo weight before starting all over again.  Five months after Toots’ entry into the world…I’m still working on it.  Add to that the whole breastfeeding factor wherein I must always wear something that allows for easy access to the boobs.  This means friends that for three years the only things I can count on fitting in are elastic waistband pants and nursing tanks.  Enter my best friend, the yoga pant.

Then there’s the whole showering/hair/make-up issue.  The discovery of dry shampoo has greatly improved my overall look, but still- it’s pretty dismal.  On most mornings the only make-up I wear is the mascara I put on the last time I wanted to look a little presentable (mascara that could be anywhere from 12 hours-2 days old).  My hair is in that awesome postpartum falling out phase, so it’s nice and thin and straggly and I’m in dire need of a bang trim.

So yeah.  You could say I’m looking pretty good.

The hard part is that I think I look ok.  I’m sporting a casual, low-key cute mom look.  I’m just a hip mom out running errands.  In my head I look like the girls who work at lululemon.  But then I catch myself in the mirror on these days and think, “how did I leave the house like this?  Was I so busy that I couldn’t have done something to improve this look?  What do other people see when they see me?”

How do others do it?  I don’t want to buy new clothes for a size that I don’t want to keep, don’t have time to get all done up most mornings, don’t have the kind of job that requires me to gussy up.  Someone please reassure me that this is just a phase that will pass once I’m done birthing and nursing babies.  Please tell me I won’t be sporting homeless chic at my son’s graduation.

*names changed to protect the hairy