A mum-of-one left with postnatal anxiety and insecurities about her body after giving birth is now feeling “empowered” after writing a children’s book about her stretch marks. She ditched her day job to become a full-time author specialising in inclusivity, dedicating time giving body positivity talks to lift other mums who may be struggling.
Kate Claxton, 35, is an ex-theatre marketing manager. She was angered by the pressure to get her body back to the size it was before giving birth and felt like she “didn’t fit into society as a mum”.
She also suffered from postnatal anxiety after her daughter was born with jaundice, which left her so forgetful she “couldn’t even remember if she had given birth to a boy or a girl”. Kate, who lives in Swindon with her husband, Tony Claxton, 35, a procurement advisor, and their three-year-old daughter, who Kate wished to remain unnamed, was struggling to remember any nursery rhymes, so she decided to create her own.
Little did she know the rhymes would become the foundation for her book, My Mum’s A Tiger, endorsed by celebrities such as Daisy May Cooper and Maria Fowler, which soon became a worldwide success. Kate felt she and other mums were not encouraged to embrace the changes to their bodies, and she wanted to “create a legacy” for her daughter and “a tonic for mums” to promote body positivity.
A proud Kate said: “I feel quite empowered now and so do other mums. Kids who have read the book have asked their mums if they have stripes, and it has given confidence to a lot of women to show their stretch marks to their children and the wider world.”
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My Mum’s A Tiger is a story of a little girl who discovers the importance of body positivity and individuality, when she learns why her mum has ‘stripes’ on her skin. After reading positive comments from mums who have read the book on her Instagram, Kate has begun to embrace her stretch marks.
When Kate’s daughter was born in September 2019 she had prolonged jaundice, making Kate feel very anxious on a daily basis. She explained: “The advice from every midwife was different.
“It wasn’t a serious thing that she had, but I was just really upset every day that she might die, that we might not get her better and that she wasn’t putting on weight.” Kate’s postnatal anxiety also made her extremely forgetful, but little did she know her brain fog would later benefit her and prompt a complete career change.
Kate said: “I couldn’t remember any nursery rhymes. I literally used to sing happy birthday because I couldn’t remember anything.
“Sometimes, I couldn’t even remember if she was a boy or a girl. So I started to make up my own nursery rhymes, and I started to write a story in my phone’s notes.”
Kate joined a local mum and baby group, thinking socialising would help improve her mental health. “I had a lot of anxiety about my own personality and how I could hold down a friendship after giving birth,” she said.
“I didn’t feel like I could string a sentence together. I was really overly paranoid about how I came across to other people.”
She felt let down by the pressure from other mums to get her body back to how it was before giving birth. “There was a suggestion from some of the mums that we have a weight loss competition when the babies are three months old, and we kind of have a weekly weigh-in WhatsApp, and it just wasn’t aligning with how I was feeling at all,” she said.
This conversation triggered something inside Kate, and she was determined to make the most of her time off work by creating something body inclusive, to educate both mums and children. Kate began to piece together notes on her phone but was unsure which element of body inclusivity to focus on.
After some research she was angered to find that most information about stretch marks referred to how to get rid of the scars, rather than how to embrace them. She said: “I think you’re probably more likely to have stretch marks than to be naturally blonde.
“But every children’s book is a blonde, little character. Why not show children some reality?”
Kate combined her passion for body inclusivity and the notes she had made when singing to her daughter to create My Mum’s A Tiger. She began writing in January 2020, and when the book was released in September that year it was a great success which led to a UK publisher approaching her to buy the international rights.
Kate was over the moon and said yes to the international deal. Within a few months, it had been bought for Australia, China, Turkey, Sweden and Denmark.
Ever since, Kate has been bombarded with positive feedback from mums, and has begun to embrace her stretch marks in public after readers’ comments confirmed she is not alone. She said: “Since having all this feedback and seeing how common these things are, and how wrapped up everyone is in their own image, I just thought, I don’t care.
“I need to take her swimming because she will love it. Before then, her dad would always take her, but now we go every week.”
After the book was released, Kate was furloughed due to the pandemic, but eventually went back to work for six months. She said: “I thought there was something more there with my book, so I decided to hand in my notice and try being an author full-time.”
Since then, Kate has not looked back and goes into mum and baby groups to talk about her book and empower women about their stretch marks. She said: “I think the book is as much of a tonic for mums as it is entertainment for children.”
In October 2022, Kate published a second inclusive children’s book, Searching For A Roarer, where the mum has a limb difference which was inspired by Kate’s late father, who was an upper limb amputee. To find out more about Kate’s books, visit www.reallyratherwild.com.
