Lots of people have body and beauty concerns when they’re pregnant – fears about their body changing and never returning to its former glory, worries about hair loss and stretch marks and a dread of getting spotty, hormonal skin. I was one of those incredibly annoying people who loved every minute of my pregnancy (conveniently ignoring the horrendous first few months during which I felt as though I was suffering the world’s worst hangover) and I really enjoyed the changes that happened to my body.
My main concern was a skincare one, really, because a few of my friends had developed very dark spots on their face during their pregnancies and some had experienced full-blown chloasma, which is when the hyperpigmentation is quite severe and looks like a sort of mask around the eyes and nose. Frequently, pregnancy marks like this disappear after the baby’s birth, but I had friends who developed dark spots from being in the sun and not protecting their skin and these seemed to have stuck around. Dark spots are one of the skincare concerns that you don’t think about so much when you’re younger – you worry more about getting wrinkles, or getting pimples – but hyperpigmentation can have a much more dramatic impact on the overall look of the skin than either of those things. Apparently the steep rise in estrogen levels during pregnancy can stimulate excess melanin production, which is what causes the dark brown patches of pigmentatio...