Getting honest! Witney Carson opened up about adjusting to motherhood after welcoming her first child with husband Carson McAllister earlier this year — and admitted it isn’t always pretty.
The Dancing With the Stars pro, 27, gave Us Weekly exclusive insight about a photo that she posted one month after giving birth to her son, Leo, in January.
“I just wanted to share more about my postpartum journey. That was what I shared when I was thinking back to that first day and just thinking that I would never recover from this. I was so not myself, I did not feel good at all,” Carson revealed to Us. “And so, I kind of wanted to be open and honest about that photo and to let people know that’s totally normal to feel that way and postpartum life is not glamorous at all.”
The Utah native posted the photo in question in February. Although she looks stunning in the mirror selfie, she didn’t feel it.
“My [postpartum] journey has been anything but glamorous. I remember the day after I had the c-section, and the nurses were getting me out of the hospital bed I cried & thought to myself, ‘I’ll never recover from this!’ she wrote via Instagram at the time. “Even though that thought was so scary for me, I was and am SO proud of this body, that it protected and nurtured this little human. Our bodies are truly amazing.. here’s to the women!! #postpartumbody #4weekspostpartum #newborn #newbornbaby #postpartum”
Carson has been very open with her followers on social media, and in January, the ballroom dancer shared a compilation video of her giving birth to her son via c-section.
“First 24 hours with our precious, beautiful boy….Everyone tells you how special bringing life into this world is but you never know exactly what they mean until it happens to you. This is my whole entire world,” she captioned the Instagram post.
Carson later told Us, “I watch that video literally every day. I am obsessed, I love that video so much. That was the day I had Leo and just wanted to really remember everything about that day.”
The So You Think You Can Dance alum and McAllister, 27, welcomed their little one on January 3. She shared her birth story with Us exclusively the following month, calling it “traumatic.”
Carson recalled, “I pushed for two and a half hours. I was fully dilated and the baby just did not want to come out. He just was, like, stuck underneath my pelvis for so long. His heart rate started going really high. So we had to do an emergency C-section and obviously we did whatever was right for the baby.”
While the new mom is willing to reflect on her own photos, she wouldn’t have the same reaction to anyone commenting on her son. “My mama bear instincts would just rage. I would have to say something,” she told Us.
For more on Carson’s motherhood journey, watch the video above.
