Toronto personal trainer shows off her 'belly rolls' to motivate clients

A personal trainer for 10 years, Jenna Doak is used to taking before and after pictures of her clients.

Now the Toronto woman is trying to help others by capturing the unfiltered truth about her body and sharing it with the world.

"So here I am. Belly rolls and all," she wrote in a Facebook post last week.

In the pictures,Doak is seated and wearing a sports bra. Her stomach, something she used to hide, is on display.

"This is my body. This wasn't easy to post, but being body positive isn't easy," the 28-year-old wrote.

Doak told CBC Toronto in a phone interview that she wanted to help her clients be less critical of themselves.

'It's okay if you have thick thighs'

"It's okay if you have thick thighs. It's okay if you have a double chin. It doesn't make you less of an athlete," she says.

Her comments and photos areanother exampleof a growing social media trend fitness professionals getting real, posting less flattering snapshots of themselves.

"If I'm going to show you the posed, put together, professional sides of me, I'm gonna make damn sure you see the not so flattering sides too, " wrote Ashley Molstad in on Facebook last fall.

The post has been shared morethan 100,000 times.

Molstad, also known as Foodie Girl Fitness, shows pictures of herself sitting and standing her stomach looking very different in each shot.

"Our worth isn't measured by how many belly rolls we have, or how many dimples [on our booty.]"

Trainers 'not all what we seem on social media'

Online fitness blogger Tiffany Brien wrote, "We are not all what we seem on social media."

Last summer, Brien'sFacebook post showing her less-than-sculptedstomach caught the attention of several media outlets.

"No, I'm not 6 months pregnant. It's just my food baby," she wrote.

"I thought I would share a bad day with you to show you nobody is "perfect."

CBC Toronto has reached out to both Molstad and Brien for comment, but so far they have not responded.

Here in Toronto, eating disorder expert Marbella Carlos says this trend is a huge shift from what we've come to expect online.

"Usually we're looking at images that have been Photoshopped or filtered or there are make-up artists," says Carlos, an outreach and education coordinator with the National Eating Disorder Information Centre.

Polished posts tied to poor body image

That can lead to poor body image or lowself-esteem, she adds.

Carlos says there are between 600,000and almost 1 million people struggling with an eating disorder in Canada, and she applauds fitness professionals for being part of the body positive movement.

"It's great that people are being more honest about what their bodies look like...and thinking about how their bodies serve them in ways that have nothing to do with just appearances," she says.

According to Jenna Doak's Facebook post, her body serves her well.

"This body can squat and deadlift over a combined 400 pounds!!"

Doak says she too once obsessed about every pound. Now she wants people to seethere's another way.

"You don't have to look like all the images we're seeing everywhere, all the time, to be healthy and be inspiring and be strong," she says.

Toronto personal trainer shares photo of body rolls

8 years ago

Duration 0:49

A Toronto personal trainer is trying to help others by sharing photos of her 'belly rolls' and make a body positive statement.