Carly Waddell wishes she could post a photo to social media without getting feedback about her body.
After returning home from celebrating her brother's wedding in Florida, the 35-year-old Bachelor in Paradise alum shared an Instagram pic of herself on Wednesday, Feb. 24. The mom of two captioned the pre-workout shot, "Ok ok vacation over...move body, stop eating Candy..."
Some of her followers replied to the post with critical remarks. One individual wrote, "This is exactly why us normal girls have anxiety. What part of you needs to stop eating candy?"
Another user commented, "Diet no!! Skinny enough." A third person added, "looking very skinny Carly."
This led the former The Bachelor contestant, who confirmed her split from husband Evan Bass in December, to take to her Instagram Story and share some thoughts.
"OK, I'm gonna get on a soapbox for a minute—bear with me," she said. "In no way is stopping candy a diet post. That's super weird, so the people that are saying that, that makes no sense. Candy's not healthy for you, like at all."
She continued, "And for the people saying I'm too skinny—that's just rude. You're just being rude. I don't understand why women can't just post a photo of themselves where they feel like they look good without getting a backlash."
Carly went on to express a powerful message about women not needing to conform to others' expectations.
"Basically, what I'm trying to say here is women are beautiful, and they're beautiful in every single stage of their life: in pregnancy, in whatever weight, in whatever form," she said. "And they should be able to post that and make jokes and not have people come after them and say mean things. And they should just feel good about themselves, so I'm going to tell myself that today."