Lea Michele celebrates her C-section scar while posing in a bikini: 'It's the greatest reminder in the whole world'

Actress Lea Michele, 34, is embracing her postpartum body. (Photo: Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic)
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Lea Michele is proud of her journey to motherhood, and everything that comes along with it.

The Glee alum, 34, who welcomed a baby boy named Ever Leo with husband Zandy Reich in 2020, took to social media to celebrate her postpartum body.

Pictured lounging in a chair sporting a black bandeau bikini and aviator sunglasses, the actress showed off the faint scar from her delivery.

"C-section scar so low you can't even see it," Michele wrote on the Instagram Story. "Although I don't mind at all because it's the greatest reminder in the whole world! I can't believe it's August and my baby's going to be 1 soon!"

The new mom showed off her C-section scar. (Photo: Instagram/Lea Michele)
The new mom showed off her C-section scar. (Photo: Instagram/Lea Michele)

Back in May, Michele reflected on her postpartum body while trying on swimsuits, Yahoo Life previously reported.

In a photo posted to her Instagram Stories that showed her wearing a black bikini, Michele shared that she was "feeling very grateful for this body right now for its strength in making a baby!"

Lea Michele revealed her postpartum body back in May while trying on swimsuits. (Photo: Instagram/Lea Michele)
Lea Michele revealed her postpartum body back in May while trying on swimsuits. (Photo: Instagram/Lea Michele)

In October of 2020, just nine weeks after having her son, she shared a photo of herself going on a hike.

"Taking some time to move my body! Feels so good!" Michele wrote.

The process of becoming a mother was a challenging one for Michele. Her late diagnosis with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) — a hormonal disorder that can cause infertility — made the process of conceiving, carrying and birthing "very scary."

"If you have extremely irregular periods, you never really know when can you get pregnant actually. And then on top of that, I had to have multiple procedures to remove polyps and cysts and scar tissues, and it just got really hard for us," Michele told Katherine Schwarzenegger in an Instagram Live back in March, Yahoo Life previously reported. "I had had my third procedure, I was really kind of down after taking so much medication and constantly healing from these surgeries. I was like, let’s just stop... I really kept feeling like maybe this just isn’t meant to be for me right now. Maybe this isn’t gonna happen, which is something that for me personally was always my biggest fear in my entire life, that I wouldn’t be able to become a mom. It’s what I’ve wanted more than anything. And emotionally it just started to build and build."

Michele and Reich made the decision to stop trying to conceive, but discovered they were expecting shortly afterwards. The actress also told Schwarzenegger about her initial disappointment about needing a C-section.

"I really wanted to have a vaginal birth," she admitted. "To me, I felt like, for whatever reason, I felt like that really means that I’m a mom. And also, I felt so weak and helpless during my pregnancy and scared and just a version of myself that I don’t ever… t was just horrible, and I felt that if I could have the experience of having a vaginal birth that I could show my strength."

Ultimately was able to move past that disappointment and embrace her own birth experience.

"The strength that we have as women, whether or not you feel like it’s there, it’s really, it’s there," she shared. "I didn’t know it existed within me. And my little baby was such a fighter, he really was a fighter. And I remember the minute I held him, the first thing I said to him was, ‘You did so good. You did it. You did so good.'"

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