Chrissy Teigen’s reaction to her new stretch marks is complicated + real

Chrissy Teigen keeps it real on her social media feeds (you can’t get more real than mesh hospital underwear) and that’s why we love her.

The very honest mom of two rose to fame as a swimsuit model, but this week she showed the world something we don’t often associate with that occupation: Stretch marks.

“I’m from a real stretch mark-prone family,” she told Refinery29 last month.

Like a lot of us, Teigen has a complicated relationship with the lines she lovingly refers to as her “stretchies”. She had them long before she ever got pregnant, and she’s been casually showing them off and singing their praises online for years, but it seems she’s found a few more since the birth of her second child, Miles, earlier this month.

“I thought I did such a good job with my creams. My hips!” she said in a recent Instagram Story, pointing her phone’s camera at her new marks and topping the image with a tearful emoji.

Chrissy Teigen

It’s not surprising that the statement sounded like part joke, part disappointment. Teigen tried hard to prevent more stretch marks from appearing during her second pregnancy, and as far along as last month it seemed like she might come through this pregnancy without any new marks around her middle.

In that recent interview with Refinery29, Teigen talked about what a diligent moisturizer she was while pregnant with Miles, noting that prevention and acceptance are the only real way to deal with stretch marks.

Citing coconut oil and Lumière as her moisturizers of choice, and husband John Legend and daughter Luna as her helpers (since she was so pregnant by that point she could hardly bend over), Teigen detailed a pretty intense stretch mark prevention regimen.

“It’s exhausting to do this 10-15 minute session of lubing up your belly and body, with all these different layers, especially when you’re like, ‘I don’t even have a stretch mark yet!'”

After all that, it makes sense that there is a crying emoji in her Instagram story. Now that the marks are here though, Teigen won’t be using any creams or lotions to try to repair them.

“I am a firm believer that no cream will sew together ripped skin,” she previously told Health. “That’s bonkers to me that anyone even buys those,” she said, adding that she’s cool with just living with her lines, because she’s never seen a real-life woman without them.

“I was lucky enough to be on sets of Victoria’s Secret shoots and Sports Illustrated shoots, where I saw the people with the most incredible bodies in the world have stretch marks. I’m so lucky I got to see that because I feel like not enough people get to see that in a world of FaceTune. They think that these faces look like this and these butts look like this. Like, I have seen the most incredible women in the world, not one of them doesn’t have stretch marks. I’m not kidding. It’s just about who’s willing to show them.”

Thanks for showing us Chrissy. We know you’ll rock those new stretchies.

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