Photos that show what pregnant women really look like.

“I wanted to create a platform for women to realise they are not alone and to feel more comfortable and confident in their skin. I want mothers to learn to instill healthy body images in the next generation of women that we are raising.”

Photographer Natalie McCain says she has always struggled to accept her weight and her body.

Realising that the insecurities she was battling were common to women everywhere, she began a journey of self-love and a photography project to celebrate her own body and the strong, capable, wonderful bodies of the women around her.

“A few years ago I decided to stop obsessing over the scale and to appreciate my body for what it has done, which is pretty amazing since it has given me two wonderful children,” McCain told Mamamia.

“I wanted to create a platform for women to realise they are not alone and to feel more comfortable and confident in their skin.”

The Honest Body Project aims to help women of different shapes, sizes and backgrounds feel beautiful and empowered and pass on that confidence to the next generation.

“I want mothers to learn to instill healthy body images in the next generation of women that we are raising,” McCain says.

The photographer’s latest photo series The Beauty In A Mother is a collection of stories and pictures of expectant mothers because, as she explains, “No mother should feel alone.”

The pictures are shared with disarmingly honest confessions about the discomfort of pregnancy, the heartbreak of miscarriage and the fears of new mothers:

“I love my body, I love my baby bump, my tiger stripes, my curves, my imperfections, my loving man, my supporting family and friends, and I’m done letting others influence how I feel about myself,” one woman writes, “I am beautiful, strong, and intelligent.”

“My favourite part of pregnancy is after labor is done and they hand me my baby. After all my struggles, I am extremely grateful that I can get pregnant and have my healthy babies,” another says. “That does not make me hate pregnancy any less. I find it miserable, and if I had the money, I would pay someone else to do it for me.”

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How you feel about these incredible birth photos will probably depend on one thing.