Tess Holliday Says She 'Feels Like a Stranger' in Her Post-Baby Body: 'Each Day Feels Like a Battle'

Tess Holliday shares that she is having trouble accepting the changes to her body she has experienced after giving birth

Photo: Tess Holliday/Instagram

Tess Holliday has always stood up to body shamers who have criticized her weight — both before and during her pregnancy — but since she gave birth to son Bowie Juniper in June, Holliday herself has been struggling to accept her body.

The curvy model, 31, shared on Instagram Saturday her challenge with her post-baby body.

“Each day feels like a battle to learn how to love my body postpartum,” Holliday shared alongside photos of herself in a bra and underwear. “It’s been six months, and my stomach is lower, my breasts are a different shape, [I have] new stretch marks, and I feel like a stranger in my body more than ever.”

Holliday admits that her body confidence issues have taken her by surprise.

“I wasn’t anticipating this at all,” she writes. “I’m not used to looking in the mirror and feeling like I don’t recognize myself, but sadly that’s my reality some days. I debated on whether or not to post this, but I think it’s important to be honest about what it’s like to be a woman in the media who recently had a baby, and the pressure that’s put on new moms to ‘lose the baby weight.'”

Holliday ends her emotional post with a reminder to herself and her followers that moms have to embrace the changes in their bodies — even if that takes some time.

“I was fat before, I carried a healthy baby and guess what, [I’m] still fat… and that’s okay,” she writes. “I have no New Years resolution to lose weight, but only to work on learning my new body and loving and nurturing it.”

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She credits her partner Nick Holliday with being a support system while she goes through these changes, but acknowledges that she shouldn’t be relying on external support to feel good about herself.

“Not a day goes by that Nick doesn’t tell me how beautiful I am, but it’s not our partner’s job to lift our spirits, we have to be our own cheerleaders,” she says. “So that’s what I will do — take it day by day. It’s a journey, not a race… and a beautiful one at that.”