This is the first part of an interview series I’m doing with interesting moms I’ve trained in fitness. These women inspire me to keep teaching and to stay fit. One of my favorite things about teaching is learning about people’s fitness journeys.

Morgan Walsh is an actress and mother of three. She gained and lost 75 lbs. three times over the course of three pregnancies. We chat about her body before and after pregnancy. Morgan tells us how she lost the baby weight and keeps it off.

Transcript of Morgan Walsh Interview, Part 1

Morgan: Hi.’m Morgan Walsh and you might know me from Burning Love and pretty soon I’m in a movie called A Better You coming to theaters near you.

Marita: Great!

Morgan: I’m so happy to be here.

Marita: Yes. I’m so happy to have you here. It warms my heart. Thank you. What was your workout routine like before you had kids?

Morgan: Oh my god. I was a machine. Um, no but I did run like two miles a day. I was really into kickboxing. And then I got pregnant I thought I’m not ever gonna lose my body because it’s that good folks. It’s that good.Yes. And then, very quickly I put on 75 pounds with my first baby. I’ve gained and lost 75 pounds three times with three kids.

Marita: Which is amazing.

Morgan: Yes. It is. And difficult. I was wearing pajamas pants for a year. Like once I got pregnant, I was pretty much in (pajamas). I’d wear black pajamas when I was dressing up. I just got used to that. I thought am I ever gonna lose this weight? Is it ever gonna come off? I just decided slowly. I gave myself permission to take time with it. It slowly came off once I was just eating balanced meal and exercising. But not aggressively because I couldn’t . You know I had kids at home. It meant that I had to work it in when I could but I think so much of it too was just like being kind to myself. I’m telling myself that I’m not going to have this weight on me forever. Most of it does have a medical, biological reason that it’s here. Right. Did you tell yourself that when you were gaining weight too? That I need, you need to do this for the health of the baby?

Marita: I think I got a little excited about making the baby super healthy.The first baby. I need this Haagen Daas for the baby.The baby wants Steve to walk to the liquor store to buy a pint of strawberry ice cream.

Morgan: I walked into a restaurant, I’m not kidding. I needed tuna sandwich on white bread with one piece of lettuce. And that had to be it. It has to be that. I did not get it and I walked out of three different restaurants. It was when I was in early pregnancy . I was so mad.

Marita: It can make you passionately angry. You must give me what I need to eat right now. Then I got into this thing when I got bigger than it was like kind of fun. Get out of my way. I’m a big belly.

Morgan: People are so nice to you when you’re pregnant. And then when you have the baby…

Marita: Nobody’s helping you.

Morgan: They kick you to the curb.

Marita: You’re, like carrying your child and trying to put the groceries in and nobody’s helping you.

Morgan: Then you’re just a breeder and they’re annoyed by you.

Marita: Yes. They hate you. She lost seventy times 3. So that’s 210 pounds. That’s a lot of weight.

Morgan: I am amazing.

Marita: You are amazing! If I lost 70 and then with Axel, I only gained thirty-five. But still a hundred five pounds is good.

Morgan: It seems like we gain more weight now. Like my grandmother. I don’t know if this happened to you. My grandma goes, “How much weight did you gain?” I said, “Fifty.”She was like, ” 50? I gained 12. ” Wow .

Marita: They were like 12 when they had babies, too.

Morgan: She was in her twenties. I just think there’s something weird.

Marita: There was a thing because my mom is an obstetrician. She said that before they would tell women to not gain as much weight . They would be like, you’re gaining too much.

Morgan: That happened to me. My doctor was like, stop eating peanut butter. Is there something else? Can you eat fruit without peanut butter?

Marita: We did this hippy dippy birthing class or somewhat hippy. It was based on the Bradley Method. All the Bradley Method books have these seventies pictures. It’s very graphic.

Morgan: Lots of hair.

Marita: Eat as much as you want. Your baby needs it.

Morgan: Yes! Thank you.

Marita: Hippies eating bananas. But but I took that to heart, too. So I think there was a shift.

Morgan: I really honestly wonder. Why is it that we’re gaining so much me weight now than before? I told myself that if I could show up for myself for twenty minutes a day . Then that would be enough. I didn’t try to pressure myself to do hour long workouts or to get to the gym. Because it’s unrealistic when you have kids, right? So I did home workout DVDs. Many times the kids were crawling on me. I would just be using weights on the floor trying to do chest flies with kids on me. It’s an extra ab work out.

Marita: It’s extra resistance when your child is on you.

Morgan: I was getting a lot of resistance.I tried not to eat the food I was making for them. That’s so hard. They’re eating macaroni and cheese or a lot of carbs a lot of dairy. Itried to just make sure anything I want to eat, I put in a salad. I did Weight Watchers. Yeah. That was also super helpful. They don’t want you to cut out any particular food. They just they caused me to be mindful about what I was putting in my body. That really helped. I lost a lot of weight that way.

Marita: Oh, that’s so great!

Leave any comments or suggestions as well. I’d love to hear from you!