Denver Boudoir Photography – The Gorgeous Mrs. R

One of the things I love most about working so closely with women in an intimate fashion, is learning their stories. One of my friends told me once “you get high on people, learning more about them” and that is SO true. I am SO excited to share this story with you from one of my clients. We laughed and cried together at her session, and I believe that her story is important. Not just for Mrs. R and her family – especially her girls – but also for other women.

I can’t believe it’s been a year since I worked with Mrs. R. I have put off sharing her photos because I wanted to share more of her story, in her words. Every story is a little different, and Mrs. R’s story struck me because of her daughters! She has twin girls, and wanted them to be involved in the process to help them be comfortable and confident in their OWN bodies. What an amazing lesson for a little girl to learn from her mother!

She sent me this the day after her session:

Hello Brooke!!!

I just wanted to send a quick note to say thank you for yesterday! I had so much fun!!! You are an amazingly beautiful woman, and made a crazy old lady with major body issues feel good about herself for a few precious hours! I can’t wait to see the pictures and I look forward to visiting and laughing with you some more!

Again, Thank you so much! YOU TOTALLY ROCK!!!!

Very sincerely,
Mrs. R

Mrs. R was kind enough to write to me to share her story, here is a little more about her feelings about her body, and how it was affecting her daughters. As parents we don’t realize how much our attitudes can affect our little ones.

Dear Brooke,

So here is my story…

To make a long story short, we’ll just say that my adolescence was pretty much the same as most. I was a Tomboy and loved being outside and mud and all that! BUT… the majority of that time people thought I looked like a boy. I wasn’t the most girly thing in the world, but I WAS a girl! The worst was being with my Dad at a store and having a gentleman let my Dad know he had a “Fine looking son there!” Dad laughed, and I was embarrassed beyond words!!!!! I never remember not liking my face before that, but for sure after! Especially in photographs! I would just see this boy face…ugh.

I’m sure this stimulated part of my falling into the New Wave/Punk Rock crowd! At one time I even had pink hair!!! Lots of black and leather, shaved head etc., my older sister bravely venturing forth with me! For whatever reason years later, I decided that being “Girly” was okay. I grew my hair back out and actually wore pink on rare occasions! During this time I actually paid attention to my body and was fairly okay in my skin. Of course, no pictures of the face if at all possible!

And then we get married, and have children. We give up our bodies and lives to these precious little miracles! Years pass by and we finally find ourselves looking at this total stranger in the mirror wondering, “What the..?” What happened to my butt? My boobs? YIKES!!!! I remember asking my husband why he hadn’t told me I looked so bad! God love him! In his total confusion, he told me I look good to him! Of course he was lying right? Now, this was not asked after having just 2 boys. This was asked after having twin girls and seeing the damage that it did to my body! About this time, I started researching plastic surgeons to fix the skin and muscle damage to my stomach. It was during these searches that I stumbled on boudoir photographs. One of the surgeons had these beautiful black and white photos of past clients. They were STUNNING! I remember wishing I had taken photos of my body before I had had children.

So, I started looking for pictures, then started thinking that I could do that if I got my body back into shape. No time with 4 kids and a job and what not! This morphed into a whole idea to do the pictures for my husband, but not until I got back into shape! HA HA! In the meantime, my little baby girls turned 9! One afternoon my youngest daughter tells me she looks fat! Are you serious? What the heck!? Where was this coming from? After letting her know how she was NOT fat, she was perfect, I started listening to my words! THAT TALK WAS COMING FROM ME!!!! Woah! Time for a little personal reflection! Listening to what I was saying! They were hearing the constant barrage of me saying, “I’m fat, I’m gross, I’m ugly, YUCK!” Shame on me! What a confusion for their little minds!

After a strange series of events, I ended up finding you and setting an appointment for a boudoir shoot! YIKES! Did I exercise? Very little! Did I change what I ate? No. I’d start the next day, right? After scheduling and you telling me to get you some ideas of what I’d like, I really got into the searching. I remember getting so angry when I would see photos of perfect little “hot bodies”. I wanted to see “REAL” women! I finally did find some photos! They were so lovely! You could see the confidence in these women! They were showing their bodies, and loving it! I wanted some pictures of me that I didn’t hate!

While researching, the girls would come over and ask what I was looking at, and I showed them. They wanted to know why. I told them I was looking for ideas for pictures I was going to do for Daddy. By now they were almost 10. They both sat down and started looking for ideas with me! It was awesome! They also started yelling at me if I sad I was fat, or ugly! Tables turned! Since they had become so involved in the idea process, I asked if they wanted to help me shop for outfits! DUH!!!! That was a great day! Seeing Mommy trying on these crazy pieces of fabric! They actually picked the bustier that I wore! They couldn’t wait to see the photos! They LOVED them and were so proud to hand them to Dad to open! They were taking pictures of him opening!

Of course my husband LOVED them! He kept staring at me all night long! I asked him why! He said he was just trying to wrap his head around the fact that I had done that for him when I was so hard on myself and the way I looked. Honestly, I cover my stomach as much as possible! Not very sexy right? You told me on the phone when we scheduled my shoot that this was how our men saw us! I told my husband after and he said it was true! My stretch marks and marks on my tummy are my Battle Scars. I earned every one of those stretch marks and weird lumps and bumps!

Why are we so hard on ourselves? I don’t know. Media telling us to be unrealistically thin? It’s crazy! I’m so glad I involved my girls! They are more confident in their own skin now. Even though they are now changing with puberty! I never want them to feel so badly about themselves! I still struggle with this every day, but I would change nothing in my life! Even the “fine looking son” part! My husband loves me, and still can’t keep his hands off me! That says more than anything! He’ll even brag about his pictures! “Look what MY wife did for me!”

As for my girls, I want them to know it’s okay to be who they are, to grow into confident beautiful women who know it’s okay to be sensual, to love themselves, to not hide themselves away! And that even though we lose ourselves when we become wives and mothers, or “let ourselves go”, that it’s okay to let their inner DIVA out and shout it to the rooftops! I just can’t believe I was 1 week from turning 42 years old at my shoot!!! Not too bad for a crazy mom! I saved money from my cookies to pay for it! It took over a year to do so!

What an amazing journey I had and I’m so grateful you were there to come along and help my inner Diva shine!

You Rock! Thank you for helping me to do something so special for him and myself! You are amazing!

Mrs. R

Her letter made me cry. As a boudoir photographer, I am consistently helping women to realize that they are NOT the ugly monsters they see in the mirror. I love that Mrs. R involved her daughters, teaching them that no matter what they believe about their bodies – it is not WHO they are, they are beautiful!

Because she loved her photos so much, Mrs. R decided to release her photos, to encourage others to take that journey too. Some of you might be wondering why I keep calling her Mrs. R – the fact is, I never attach names to boudoir photos. I want all of my clients to love their photos so much that they want to share, not only with my blog readers and fans online, but with their own friends and family!

So on that note, I am VERY excited to share some photos from a year ago, with this beautiful story.

A before and after photo wasn’t something that I did regularly with my clients last year, Mrs. R was gracious enough to send me a phone picture to share!

She also sent me pictures of her husband, SUPER proud of his awesome book and gorgeous wife!