baby

When fitness influencer Emily Skye didn't "snap back" after her baby, she felt like an imposter.

Emily Skye isn't your typical fitness influencer.

The personal trainer and mum-of-two not only shares her tips and workouts with her 2.5 million followers, but she's also extremely candid with them - from posting about her unexpected home birth (yep, that happened) to the reality of "bouncing back" to her pre-baby body.

Watch: 5 pregnancy safe exercises with Emily Skye. Post continues below.


Video via Mamamia.

In an Instagram post in March, Emily explained how unlike other celebrities and fitness experts, she didn't "snap back" from either of her pregnancies. 

And at one point, that made her feel like an imposter.

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Emily told Mamamia the feeling crept in after the birth of her now three-year-old daughter, Mia.

"After my daughter, my first baby, I felt like an absolute imposter because when I looked at social media and other fitness trainers and influencers, a lot of them snapped back really fast," Emily said.

"There's nothing wrong with that because everyone's different, but I just felt like I had spent basically my whole life being fit and then I had a baby... and I couldn't get back in shape very quickly.

"I didn't look like I was fit, and people [seem to] have this whole thing [that] if someone doesn't look fit, they don't believe anything they say.

"So I did feel like that for a period of time during both the postnatal periods," she said.

In June 2020, Emily welcomed her second child, Izaac, during an unexpected home birth. 

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As she told Mamamia, she hasn't "snapped back" from that pregnancy either. In fact, this time it's been harder.

"It's been almost a year and I'm still not where I was before. Not that it's my goal, but it's taken me a lot longer," she said. "That's the reality for a lot of people - you don't just snap back."

The difference is that this time, she doesn't feel the need to.

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"I think I had more pressure the first time around," Emily said. "I felt like I had to be fit-looking for people to take me seriously and be credible... I felt that I needed to be that.

"This time I was a lot better. I've done it before and I learned so much about myself. I've evolved, I've grown to love myself more, accept myself more. Especially after having two babies."

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She's also been kinder to herself, post-baby number two.

"I've been a lot easier on myself," she said.

"This time, instead of looking at what I wasn't and how far I had to go, I really practiced gratitude for what I had, and what my body was doing.

"Rather than looking at how my body looked, I'd appreciated how it functions and what it does for my babies," she added.

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In February, Emily launched her post-pregnancy program on her platform, Emily Skye FIT. To make her content relatable and helpful, she filmed it in real-time.

"I did it with my real body," Emily explained. 

"I wanted to be at the same stage as everyone else would be at, and not wait a year until I was fit again. I wanted to show that it was challenging for me even though I'm a fitness professional."

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Through this, Emily hopes to remind other women not to compare themselves to others.

"I know what it feels like. Especially mentally, having your body go through so much," she said. "Seeing those changes and feeling those changes in your body, it's really hard looking at other people online because you're filled with this idea of perfection.

"You're looking at other people, 'fit' people who just pop out a baby and two weeks later, they've got their abs back. It's like, 'Why aren't I like that?' I never want women to feel like that," she said.

She also hopes it will help women reconsider how they speak about post-baby bodies - their own and others.

"I think we're all still learning. At the end of the day, we are all different and some people do snap back, some people don't gain any weight during pregnancy. That's not unrealistic because it's not unrealistic for them," she said.

"I just think we need to look at ourselves and remember we're not the same as others. Every time we feel bad about ourselves or find ourselves picking apart our bodies, we should immediately switch that thinking to, 'Wow, look how amazing my body is because look at what it's doing for me every day.' 

"That's what I've been doing and it helps me a lot."

Feature image: Instagram/@emilyskyefit