The summer may be flying by, but there is still time to sit by the pool or chill at the beach, and an ostomy does not mean NO BIKINI! In fact, there is an article in the New York Post today (August 19) that says that very thing. It featured 4 women who had life and body-altering issues, and these women showed the beauty of making lemonade out of lemons. One of the women had a preventative double mastectomy after testing positive for the BRCA mutation, the breast cancer gene; one had hanging skin on her stomach and breasts after losing more than 60 lbs; and another had a full amputation of her right and dominant arm as well as having her right thigh and breast reconstructed. They are all the heroes of this story, but I want to share with you the story of the fourth woman, an ostomate, and her road to proudly modeling her bikini with her pouch!
Claire Bonti suffered from debilitating Crohn’s Disease since the age of 13, and she became gravely ill at 24 years old, five years ago. Although along the way she had been told an ostomy may be in her future, she was not interested in the discussion because she felt it would be “social suicide.” “Besides, she thought, “I’ll never wear a bikini again.”
Claire found that only a few months later, she was empowered to wear her two-piece bathing suit after seeing a glamorous photo of a model wearing a red, white and blue pouch cover over her ostomy on Instagram. She mentions in the article in the New York Post that she asked friends after that Independence Day pool party if anyone asked about her visible pouch and the answer was “no!” One friend said someone thought she was “wearing a bandage over a new tattoo, or something.”
The story just gets better in that Claire now has a steady boyfriend, Justin, and a senior job at the Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation. She wears her bikini proudly, expressing “that if anyone has a problem with it, it’s theirs” and not hers.
I love this girl! Self-esteem comes from our own awareness that we are ABSOLUTELY more than fine the way we are. We must allow ourselves to be more than worthy and more than wonderful. It is so important to accept in ourselves what we accept in others…to be kind and caring to ourselves, to be nurturing and supportive, just way we would be to anyone we treasured!