SHAUGHNA:
Love Island star Shaughna Phillips opens up to Closer’s Neeru Sharma about embracing her curves, building her self-worth and being a single mum…
She racked up over 200,000 likes and was hailed a “role model” for showing off her “real post-baby body” in her underwear while vowing to stop using filters in a recent body positivity post on Instagram. But despite bravely bearing all, Love Island star Shaughna Phillips admits she almost “chickened out” of uploading her now viral post.
“That picture was about three months in the making because I was working up the confidence,” explains Shaughna, 30, as she bounces 11-month daughter, Lucia, on her knee. “I wrote the caption and sent it to my manager to post it for me. I didn’t go on Instagram because I was nervous about the response or if trolls would say something mean about how I look!”
Though she needn’t have worried; her comments were awash with women thanking her for her “refreshing” stance, and she was even approached by a stranger. “I was in Next, and someone came up to me and said, ‘Oh my god, I shared your post in my group chat with my friends and we said, good on her – she’s just like us!’ I was overjoyed I’d actually helped someone and thought, ‘Sod what anyone thinks of me!’”
And Shaughna, who found fame in the South African villa in 2020, exudes the same attitude as she poses for our shoot to celebrate her body. The star shares Lucia with ex-boyfriend Billy Webb, who is currently serving a nine-year prison sentence for drug offences, and has since become a single mum. She admits motherhood has completely changed her outlook on body image, diet culture and social media.
MIRROR IMAGE
She says, “I feel like I’m a mirror for Lucia now, she copies everything I do, and it’s made me think twice about how I am around her. My mum sat on my bed the other day and was talking about how she felt fat, and I said, ‘Mum – I don’t want you saying things like that in front of Lucia’ – I don’t want her knowing that sort of talk, from me included.”
She adds, “It hasn’t been an overnight thing. When I gave birth, I was 6st heavier, and leaving the house terrified me because I wasn’t comfortable in my skin. I nearly signed up to a gym three weeks after having Lucia, a leaflet came through the door and I thought, ‘Shall I do it?’ Then I realised, this is mad! If I let how I look affect me, it’s going to affect Lucia. This summer, she’ll be running around the park, and I’ve decided I don’t want to avoid going out or cover up when it’s 25 degrees – life is way too short to be hating my body.”
Shaughna’s also changed how she uses social media after being horrified when a filter she used automatically slipped on to Lucia’s face. She says, “Instagram is all s
