Before me sits Nancy, a glowing vision of post-partum health. Looking svelte in her aquajogging gear, you’d never guess she’d just won a battle with her weight demons.
Only a month ago, she was five kilograms heavier and struggling with a bad body image. “Everyone says the baby weight will go away,” she says, “but it had been nine months.” She wore elastic-waist pants, and burned with shame whenever she caught her “distending and disgusting” bump reflected in a window.
One day, she had to face the truth: “I couldn’t handle what I saw in the mirror anymore,” she recalls, “it looked like I was carrying the weight of two people.” She decided to see her doctor, who explained that she’d have to shed the water weight first. “Once I’d done that, the pounds came off like this,” she snaps her fingers agonisingly slowly, whilst screaming for an epidural.
With one high-intensity, extended workout she was 3kgs lighter, and within a fortnight her old trousers fit her perfectly. “I was ecstatic,” she says, “I still am!” In love with the exercise rush and the results, she recommends her methods to everyone who’ll listen: “it doesn’t have to be a baby. If you’re top-heavy there’s trepanning, you know? The possibilities are endless.”