Ashley Graham: "It felt like an alien was in my body"

Supermodel Ashley Graham (32) became a mother in January. In her first major post-pregnancy interview, she speaks with the British edition of "Harper's Bazaar" about the crisis she experienced during pregnancy and how difficult it was for the model to cope with her constantly changing body.

"It was like an alien was taking over my body"

When Ashley Graham heard last spring that she was pregnant, she was initially delighted. But the more her body changed during pregnancy, the less she could handle it. For many a figurehead for "body positivity", the curvy model suddenly found herself in a situation in which she did not recognize her own body. "I thought, 'What about the things I said to myself? What about the commitment to my body?' It really took a while to understand internally that my body was changing because it felt like an alien was taking it over. "

Graham was only able to really enjoy her pregnancy from the third trimester, before that she was certain that she was suffering from prenatal depression: "If you change from laughing to crying within 30 seconds, you wonder if everything is OK. Now you know me: this is to be pregnant. " What helped her was exchanging ideas with other pregnant women, noticing that she was not alone.

Corona lockdown on her mother

In early March, Ashley Graham fled to Nebraska with her newborn son Isaac and husband Justin Ervin (31), where her mother owns a ranch. The young family lives in New York, which has been hardest hit by the corona pandemic in the United States. The past few weeks have not been easy for her, she lost a friend to the virus, and several acquaintances in New York fell ill.

But spending this special time with a newborn in her childhood home is for the model the silver lining. "We have all these special moments with Isaac, it is nostalgic to be with my son in the house I grew up in. I am so thankful."