A year ago, there was no point telling Nicole Whippy she was beautiful because she simply didn’t want to hear it. The bubbly Outrageous Fortune actress, who returns to our screens this week in the final season of the popular Kiwi television show, had just given birth to baby girl, Pearl, and felt “huge”.

Not only that, during a period when most first-time mums are at home acclimatising to their new life and contemplating the ever-growing mountain of washing, the 32-year-old was back fi lming scenes for the new series under the unforgiving gaze of a camera lens.

“Pearl was 10 weeks old when I went back to work,” Nicole begins, tucking her shapely legs underneath her as she chats. “So it was a real struggle at first. I put enormous pressure on myself to lose my baby weight – and I really hate having to admit that. I mean, I had just had an amazing home birth, I had fought hard to get the hang of breastfeeding, and amongst all this change, I was telling myself I needed to get back to a size 10.”

Nicole, who wore size 14-16 clothing in the weeks following Pearl’s birth in June last year, says that although she knew she wasn’t being rational, she felt extremely self-conscious about her weight.

“My boobs were humungous and my tummy was massive! I felt big everywhere,” she sighs, rolling her eyes. “Before I had Pearl, I had honestly thought that once she was born, the weight would just fall off me – because that is what you see, or at least what you think you see, with other women. I have friends who have done nothing but feast and breastfeed their babies and they are skinnier now than they’ve ever been! So I couldn’t work out why that didn’t happen to me.”

Meanwhile, her adoring partner Tom Holden (25) and her workmates were struggling to see what the fuss was about. “To their credit, the crew at Outrageous Fortune never put any pressure on me to be a certain size or look a certain way,” says Nicole, who plays Kasey on the TV3 drama.

“Our show has always been about doing good work. None of us are super skinny and we’re not hired to be tiny little pretty things – and we all eat, lots! “And I know it sounds cheesy, but Tom thought I was beautiful, even when I was at my largest. He couldn’t understand why I was so down on myself. He would say to me, ‘Look at the amazing thing you’ve done – you’ve given us a baby. Leave yourself alone!’”

Nicole, who had planned to sweat the kilos away at a gym once Pearl arrived, says she quickly realised that wasn’t a sensible idea so soon after giving birth. So she took advice from her castmate and friend Robyn
Malcolm and signed up at Auckland Pilates studio re:ab. “I’d watched Robyn’s body change through her two pregnancies, but she’d always looked so hot. So I asked her, ‘What’s your secret?’ and she credited Pilates.”

Nicole’s friends would walk baby Pearl up and down the street outside the studio several times each week while Nicole stretched, tightened, and strengthened her way to a new improved body. “Pilates felt like a very gentle way of easing myself back into exercise and helping my body recover,” explains Nicole. “The first thing that improved was my posture – I learned to push my chest out rather than curve it in! And I noticed when I picked Pearl up – who was quite a heavy little baby – that I became stronger around my core, which is the area that really turns to jelly when you’re pregnant!”

But the biggest changes were to Nicole’s sense of calm and wellbeing. “Exercise freshens you,” Nicole smiles.
“It helps you to focus on your baby rather than worrying about everything else. I began to realise that my body’s main priority was breastfeeding this little person, and that it was important we all kept our sanity! And while I did lose some weight, slowly and surely, it wasn’t all about getting back to a size that I thought I needed to be. Mentally, I felt amazing.”

When Nicole switches on the television this week to watch Outrageous Fortune, she says she will be watching herself at her largest – but she’s happy with that. “I have no idea what I will look like on screen!” she laughs. “Kasey is pregnant, of course, so it is what it is.”

She’s now staying super fit and active through a combination of Pilates, gym work-outs and her twice weekly indoor netball games in an Outrageous Fortune social team. “I play with Siobhan (Marshall) and Kirk (Torrence). The other teams take one look at us and think that we’re going to be terrible, but we’re actually really awesome! We won C-grade, I’ll have you know!”

Nicole says if she and Tom decide to have another baby – something that could well be on the cards, she smiles – she’ll go easier on herself next time. “I will cherish myself and try to step away from all those negative thoughts,” she says. “And I’ll do Pilates right through my pregnancy, if I can!

“I appreciate my body so much more now than I ever have before,” she continues. “I love that I am able to run around with my daughter all day and keep up! I still have hard days, of course, but I now know that it’s a pressure I put entirely on myself, as so many other women do. Mostly, I am just grateful that I’m strong and fit and healthy.”