Sarah Harris: "The insinuation that I was a ‘beast’ and ‘looked like a truck’, it didn’t even make me sad."

Studio 10 host Sarah Harris has made it her mission to be open and honest about the realities faced by pregnant women. And between posting photos of her ‘cankles’ On Instagram, blasting The Daily Mail for publishing ‘off duty’ pictures of herself and writing a column for the Daily Telegraph defending fellow pregnant celebrity Michelle Bridges, it’s safe to say Harris has done just that.

Speaking to The Motherish, Harris said pregnancy has taught her a lot about her body and the fact that it’s not an ‘ornament’. She says, “Like any other woman I have hang ups and I’ve had a pretty uneasy relationship with my body, especially starting out in the media quite young. The way I deal with it is by realising that my body is not an ornament, it’s actually growing a child and is hopefully going to be strong enough to push a child out.”

For Harris, the first three months of pregnancy were the biggest learning curve. "I put on quite a lot of weight. I’ve put on while a lot of weight through the pregnancy but the first three months were a real eye opener for me. As soon as I popped and you can see what is going on with your body and what it was actually doing, my whole perspective on my body actually changed," she adds.

And Harris certainly isn't going to give into the common pressure to bounce back immediately after giving birth. "I haven’t been hung up on getting my abs back straight away and losing the baby weight straight away. I think with me, it’s going to take months and months and months," she believes.

For Harris, it's not a decision she's had much say in, revealing exercise in the last part of her pregnancy has been incredibly difficult. "I’ve had pubis symphysis which is problems with your pelvis which has made it hard for me to walk. So that’s been really crappy. You have to be gentle with yourself. Your body has got a pretty big job it’s doing at the time and there’s not much room for vanity. Your body is not yours for a while, that’s for sure," she shares.

Speaking about the Daily Mail publishing unflattering photos of herself, Harris says, "I was really pissed off at that whole Daily Mail thing and I certainly made that known. What I was pissed off about what not that ‘they got me at an unflattering angle’ because I think I look like a normal pregnant chick. What pissed me off what the subtext of it and the subtext was, here’s a girl on television that usually looks really good and look at how fat she looks. Basically they left it up to the commenters to really rip into me.

"You first see yourself and go, ‘Oh God, that’s a really unflattering photo’. But then you think that’s a normal woman pregnant with a baby and I’m not going to be ashamed of it, that’s how I look. That’s how I look off duty and I think you have to own it, you have to own your pregnancy body. The insinuation that I was a ‘beast’ and that I ‘looked like a truck’, it didn’t even make me sad, I didn’t cry about it. I was just angry. I was like ‘bugger off!’

"It was a really good exercise for me to point out that pregnancy isn’t beautiful and lovely and ethereal for everyone. Things swell, I can barely wear my runners at the moment. Everything is swollen. Not everyone ends up as these supermodel creatures with basketballs up their shirts. Some women have really rough pregnancies and that’s okay too. My goal was to normalise looking like that," Harris reveals.

And Harris' goal to normalise the way women look during pregnancy was made clear when she shared a photo of her 'cankles'. Speaking about the photo, Harris explains, "Every time I post those really honest pregnancy photos of myself I’ve had a really good response. As women we tend to think we have to put on this facade we’re coping and everything is fine and dandy, when in reality things might not be going so well. I think if you’re honest and kind of go look, I’m a bit vulnerable, have a look at my swollen ankles, they’re so swollen I can’t wear heals. I’m wearing a Mumu around the house because it’s all that fits right now."

It certainly hasn't been prefect either, with Harris opening up about her not-so-pleasurable babymoon. She says, "I went away on holidays mid-year and it was 40 degrees, I’m wearing spanx. Not to suck me in but to stop the chub rub between my legs. People are like, ‘What a beautiful babymoon’ and I’m like ‘Not really, no. I’m wearing spanx in 40 degree weather. There’s nothing attractive about this at all. I’m not posting these gorgeous photos of my sun-kissed bump. I was hot. I was uncomfortable. Not drinking. Hating every minute of it actually."

On finding out that she is having a baby boy, Harris shares, "I had no idea or inkling what I was having. I didn’t feel any kicking for quite a long time. My placenta was right at the front, that’s why I wanted to find out. I thought, maybe it will help me bond a bit more if I know what’s inside of me instead of just this alienesque blob. I had no preference either way.

"It was like, “Wow. God. I’ve never understood boys and now I’ve got one in me.” It’s quite surreal to have a penis growing inside of you. Don’t you reckon? Oh my god, I have a penis in me right now. I’ve just heard that boys love their mums and they’re pretty simple in terms of parenting them, they’re a bit rough and tumble. They’re a hundred miles an hour but you just have to keep up."

And she even gave us some hints on the baby name. "It’s such a personal choice, the baby name thing. We’ve got a few baby names in mind. We’ll do something very traditional I think. But we just want to meet him first and see if he actually suits that name. My name is Sarah Harris. It’s a pretty basic name. I think I’ll end up getting some pretty basic to follow. Something that’s easy to spell," Harris says.

"Everything is done. I’m super prepared. I’m ready to rock and roll, I just need a kid now," Harris jokingly concludes.