The 36-year-old New Yorker shares how she’s finding peace during her first pregnancy.
This article is featured in a series showcasing how Equinox coaches, group fitness instructors, and members navigate different life stages and take control of their health as women. Read all the articles here.
Michelle Rose Murphy’s life is always in flux. The 36-year-old New Yorker’s resume spans from teaching yoga to modeling and acting, and globetrotting to do it all. Amid the chaos, Equinox has been her constant.
A self-described “class girly,” Murphy has spent the last three years working out at her New York City Club up to five times a week, usually a Pilates or barre class. (It helps that she lives just a seven-minute walk away from Equinox Hudson Yards.) This consistency, she says, is what has made the biggest difference in her fitness. “I gained a lot of beautiful lean muscle and became very strong, much more than when I did yoga for years,” she adds. Her core strength improved, and pain from her fibromyalgia also subsided.
Now, at 32 weeks pregnant, Murphy keeps showing up. This phase has been more comfortable than she imagined it would be. “Life kind of throws you curveballs through the year, right?” she says. “I feel like being pregnant hasn't been, like, much different than bad times in life, like the prior seasons that you [go] through.”
As the trimesters pushed forward, so did her career; she worked on a film set to premiere in May, modeled for maternity brands, and released her first musical single, “On Blue.” In the Club, Murphy’s go-to group fitness instructors helped her modify exercises to be safe for her changing body. While traveling internationally for weeks at a time, she followed along with classes on the EQX+ app, prioritizing breathwork, light stretching, and meditation. “It's really hard to breathe [right now], and apparently, I guess that's normal,” she says. “So I've been kind of laying low from being aggressive, because I have found less is more during this time.”
With her dialed-down routine, Murphy admits it can feel like she’s backsliding on her progress. Keeping low expectations, and trying to feel at peace whether she meets or surpasses them, has helped. “I feel like my best kind of looks different day by day…I've been really trying to show up patiently with whatever that means for that day and not get all wrapped up in the expectations of everything,” she says.
There’s a lot of unknown to dwell on: how her son’s birth will go, what condition her body will be in afterward, or what those first few weeks of postpartum life will be like. But now’s not the time to try to predict the future. “[I’m] kind of just being like, ‘Let it go. It will be what it will be,’” she says.
Still, Murphy allows herself to dream a little. She says she’s excited to see what her life looks like as an active mom in New York City, supported by a network of friends and Equinox instructors, and how she’ll grow mentally in this next life stage. “I think the thought of being a mom excites me,” she says. “In the beginning, I couldn't physically feel my baby, but now I can feel him a lot, and it's kind of making it more real. I just know that my life, the priorities, will probably be very much different than they were before.”
Announcement photos by Ammar Rowaid.