A Netflix star and new mother has proudly shown her fans what her stomach looks like less than a month after gave birth to her son Flynn, admitting that she isn’t used to having extra skin on her tummy.
Colleen Ballinger, 32, who is best known as her online comedic personality Miranda Sings – which she developed into Netflix series Haters Back Off – opens up about her postpartum body in a candid video she posted to her Colleen Vlogs YouTube channel on Wednesday.
‘I wanted to show you the progress with my pregnant tummy because I think it’s important for people to see the realistic view of what you look like after you have a baby — ’cause it don’t go back to normal, ya’ll,’ she says in the clip.
Candid: Colleen Ballinger, who is best known as her online personality Miranda Sings, opens up about her postpartum body in a video she posted to her YouTube channel on Wednesday
Keeping it real: In the clip, the 32-year-old shows fans what her stomach looks like when she is sucking in (left) and what it looks like when she lets it out (right)
The new mom, who welcomed her first child on December 10, explains that the hospital gave her a postpartum belly wrap to wear, which she appreciated.
‘After you give birth, there’s a lot of extra fluid in there and everything’s kind of jumbling around,’ she recalls.
‘I felt really good wearing this after because it kind of held everything together,’ she adds. ‘I could literally feel my organs like sloshing around when I walked right after I gave birth.’
Colleen goes on to show her 2.8 million YouTube subscribers what her stomach looks like with the wrap sucking her in and what it looks like without it.
‘I feel like my stomach has gone down a lot faster than, maybe, things I’ve seen online, but this is what I look like,’ she says.
Honesty: Less than a month after giving birth, Colleen admits she’s not used to having extra skin on her stomach
Helpful: The new mom explains that the hospital gave her a postpartum belly wrap to wear (pictured), which she appreciated
Colleen also reveals what her stomach looks like when she is sucking in and then what it looks like when she lets it out.
She eventually turns around to show viewers her stomach from the front, pointing out that there is a ‘lot of extra skin’ because her baby bump stretched it out.
‘I’m not used to feeling skin here, which is really weird,’ she admits. ‘So, I don’t know how that goes away, like what happens to your skin, but this is what I’m looking like y’all.’
Colleen says she hasn’t done anything to try to make her stomach shrink, although she is now eating half as much as she did when she was pregnant.
‘When I was pregnant, I was hungry all the time,’ she explains. ‘I wanted to eat constantly, and now that I have a baby, I’m so busy taking care of the baby and running around and working and whatever that I just don’t east as much.
Happy day: Colleen and her husband Erik Stocklin welcomed their son Flynn on December 10. The YouTuber revealed last week that she and Erik secretly got married in 2018
Natural approach: Colleen credits breastfeeding with helping her stomach shrink, but she insists she hasn’t done anything special to try and lose weight
Throwbacks: Colleen says looking at pictures of herself before she was pregnant has made her realize that she was too thin
‘So, I am eating like normal meals, whereas when I was pregnant, I was eating like eight meals a day. That might have helped it to go down.’
Colleen also credits breastfeeding with helping her stomach shrink, but she notes that she has to wait at least six weeks before exercising.
‘You’re not supposed to exercise or anything especially in my condition with how many stitches I have downstairs,’ she says. ‘So, right now, I’m trying not to worry about it and trying to just live my life and hope it all goes back kind of naturally.’
The YouTube star recalls seeing Cardi B rocking ‘a six-pack’ about a month after she gave birth, but she knows that’s not realistic because ‘every body is different.’
‘I don’t know. I was ferociously, terrifyingly thin when I first got pregnant. I was watching videos of me from before I was pregnant and my face was so thin,’ she says.
Throwback: ‘Now that I look back, I looked really creepy skinny — for me,’ she admits. Colleen is pictured in October 2017
Happy medium: The YouTube star says she’s like her body to get somewhere in between pregnancy and what she looked like before
‘I would like to get somewhere in between pregnancy and where I was before I got pregnant,’ she adds. ‘Now that I look back, I looked really creepy skinny — for me. I was too skinny for me.’
It’s been an exciting year for the Haters Back Off actress. Not only did she welcome her first child, but a few days before the new year, she revealed that she and her fiancé Erik Stocklin got married in 2018.
Colleen spilled the beans in a YouTube video about her highs and lows of the year.
‘This was the hardest year of my whole life, but it was also the best year I’ve ever had,’ she says in the clip that she posted on December 29.
‘This year I got pregnant and engaged and married all in the same year,’ she says. ‘Yeah, we got married. Whoops, forgot to tell you that one.’
Later on in the clip, she gushes about how much she loves Eric.
‘I’m so happy that I have an incredible husband who helps me take care of [Flynn] and he takes care of me and he’s the most selfless, wonderful, sweet, perfect man,’ she says.
‘I feel so lucky. I don’t know how he exists. I hope my son is exactly like him when he grows up.’