An influencer has hit back at trolls who criticized her for posing in a bikini with her teenage son.
Fitness influencer and mom-of-four Sophie Guidolin is the founder of the leading online health and fitness program, The Bod.
In 2022, Guidolin, who lives in Gold Coast, Australia, sparked controversy after sharing pictures of her son Kai in celebration of his 15th birthday.
The post, which was seemingly removed from her feed, was captioned “Happy 15th Kai,” and included snaps from when her son was a baby, his teenage years, and him embracing her while she was sporting a green leopard print bikini.
Check out the now-deleted post below:Many users slammed Guidolin for posting the "inappropriate" picture which led to the mom responding to the backlash on her Instagram Story.
In the video obtained by Daily Star, Guidolin said: "I just want to say as well, those who have followed me for a while may remember I posted a bikini workout on the beach that had Kai in it and I got slammed for it."
"The good thing to mention here is that I wear bikinis in front of my kids because my body is normal," she continued. "Having a body is normal, having body parts is normal, it's not sexualized, it's nothing shameful, and it's something I reiterate and drive home here with my boys."
"So when they see me in a bikini, they don't think anything other than 'Hmm, mum's tanning, mum's going to the beach, going for a swim,'" she explained. "They don't see me and be like 'Oooh what a sexy bum you've got.' So stop sexualizing bodies, and bodies will stop being sexualized."
Guidolin, who competes in a bikini for bodybuilding competitions, also spoke out more about the criticism she received on Sunrise, stating that she was “so surprised” that so many people had an issue with the photo.
“When I posted the photo, I had just had Invisalign on my teeth, so when I posted it, the first thing that I thought or considered was can you see my Invisalign in the photo, nothing to do with the bikini,” she said, as cited by 7News.
The fitness star she has “deliberately raised” her four children to be comfortable with “the culture that we live in," with her son Kai adding: “I didn’t even have a second thought of it when I saw the picture at first, then my mom told me she got slammed on Instagram for posting that picture."
“I’ve been there since day one with my mum when she first started competing," he said. “It’s just normal now and I don’t get how people can’t understand that.”
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