Stretch marks: spiritual meaning and emotional causes

What stretch marks are

Stretch marks (striae) are lines or streaks in the skin where it has been stretched quickly. As the surface expands, the deeper layer of the skin, the dermis, is pulled beyond its give and its fibres break. New marks are often pink, red, purple, brown or dark, depending on skin tone. Over months they slowly fade to paler, silvery lines that look a little like scars.

Stretch marks are very common and harmless. They appear with fast growth in puberty, in pregnancy, and when weight goes up or down quickly. They are more frequent in women, but many men and some children have them too. Genes play a part, and so do steroid creams or tablets. Rarely, they point to a hormone condition called Cushing's syndrome. They show mostly on the tummy, breasts, hips, thighs, buttocks, upper arms and back.

They usually fade with time but rarely disappear completely. There is little evidence that creams and oils prevent or remove them. Some treatments, such as retinoid creams on new marks (not during pregnancy), laser treatment or microdermabrasion, can make them less visible.

The emotional meaning of stretch marks

Spiritually, stretch marks are read as the trace of being stretched further than you could comfortably go. The skin is the boundary between you and the world. When it has to expand faster than it can adapt, it marks the place.

Gaining and losing

Stretch marks often go with the swing of "I gain, I lose". The body changes shape quickly, and often the life around it changes too. You may ask what else has swelled and shrunk at speed in your life, and how hard you have pushed to keep up.

Worry about appearance

Stretch marks are linked to a worry about how you look. They often appear in places people already judge harshly in themselves. The question is how much weight appearance carries in the way you value yourself, and whose eye you are looking through when you check.

Suppleness and your own nature

The skin's elasticity becomes an image: how supple are you, with life and with yourself? Stretch marks may ask whether you live as a natural extension of who you are deep down, or whether you are pulling yourself into a shape that is not quite yours.

Disagreement and tension

Strong differences of opinion can leave you very uneasy. When you stay tense through them, holding your ground rigidly or swallowing your view, the strain is pictured in skin that has been pulled tight.

Hurt, attachment and vulnerability

Stretch marks can also sit beside a feeling of being hurt or bruised in attachment: in loving, in depending on someone, or in letting yourself be vulnerable. The mark shows where something gave way.

The rod you use on yourself

In French, vergetures (stretch marks) contains verge, an old word for a rod or a switch. Heard this way, the lines look like the stripes a rod would leave, and the question becomes: who is striking? Often it is your own inner critic, lashing you for how you look or for what you did.

In pregnancy, puberty and weight change

The circumstances in which the marks appear can shape the questions:

• In pregnancy, the body grows fast to make room for a baby. The marks can be seen as the record of a deep stretch, physical and emotional, rather than as a flaw. The question is whether you can let yourself change shape without turning harsh on yourself.
• In puberty, the body changes faster than the image a young person has of themselves. The question may be how gently they, and the people around them, are meeting who they are becoming.
• After gaining and then losing weight, the marks can carry the memory of the effort. They may ask whether that change came with self-criticism, and whether you can keep what you gained in strength without the lashes.

A gentler way to hold it

• Put the rod down. Notice when you strike at yourself with words, and choose a softer sentence instead.
• Let your body change. Bodies grow, carry, gain and lose. A mark is a record of that, not a verdict on you.
• Practise flexibility. In one disagreement this week, try to understand the other view without giving up your own.
• Return to your own nature. Ask what feels truly like you, and make one choice in that direction.
• Care for the hurt. If attachment or vulnerability has bruised you, give that hurt some attention instead of hardening around it.
• Be understanding both ways. The gentleness you give yourself makes it easier to give it to others, and theirs easier to receive.