Ashley Graham Wants to End the Stigma Around Formula Use; Explains Her Decision to Stop Breastfeeding Her Twins

Ashley Graham is a mother to three children – two of which are twins – so she has plenty of experience with motherhood and everything that comes with it. Of all the things she has learned, one of the most prominent is that every mother has their own opinions, preferences, and beliefs on how to raise a child. 

And that’s exactly what she learned when she decided to stop breastfeeding her twins – who celebrated their first birthday last month. In the past, she was very open about her experience with breastfeeding her first son and while she breastfed her twins for the first five months of their life, she decided to stop. 

Her decision was met with a lot of sideways comments from other mothers, who believe breastfeeding a child is the only way to feed them. It worked well with her first child, but her perspective started to change when the twins came along – she quickly realized just how difficult it is to breastfeed two children at once. 

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In an interview with ‘The Daily Show’ on Tuesday, Ashley Graham spoke with host Chelsea Handler and defended her decision to stop breastfeeding her twins at the 5-month mark. She explained the difficulty behind it all, adding she felt like she was ‘feeding a nation’ and decided to switch to formula use.

“There’s also this whole thing with people telling you how to feed your child. With my first kid, I was like, ‘I could only breastfeed. This is the right way,” Graham admitted. “I had the twins, and I was like, ‘I’m not doing this. This is not working here. Like, both of you want both of these? This is a lot of work.’”

Now that the twins are one year old, she can see that she made the right decision in switching to baby formula. While many mothers would like to believe differently, her twins are both strong and happy. “So I don’t think we should be telling people how they should be feeding their kids,” she proclaimed. 

Ashley Graham welcomed her first son, Isaac Menelik Giovanni Ervin, on January 18, 2020 with husband Justin Ervin – the couple started dating after meeting in church in 2009 and tied the knot in 2010. The twins – Malachi Ervin and Roman Ervin – came along on January 7, 2022. That’s three January birthdays!

Ashley Graham Talks About Being Honest on Social Media

At the beginning of the interview on Tuesday, Chelsea Handler praised Ashley Graham for her ability to keep it real when discussing life – unlike a lot of these other models, according to Handler. Graham said she likes to keep it real and honest, adding it’s something she hopes to see more of on social media. 

Handler also brought up Graham’s commitment to body positivity. “I like to represent myself as someone who’s just happy with who I am. And I’ve had a journey, like it is a journey – body confidence, being okay with who you are is just a journey,” she said, adding there are ups and downs, but you go through it. 

She goes on to explain how she thinks about herself when she was younger and what some of the celebrities were talking about back then, in regards to body positivity. Now that more people are talking about it and more people have the platform to do so, we’re seeing those conversations come to light.

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Ashley Graham talks about doing away with this idea of perfection and learning to be happy with your physical features – and if you can’t be happy with it, then be neutral with it and find peace in knowing that your body is working and functioning like everyone else’s. It’s time we all start loving ourselves again!