Even Dancing With The Stars professional dancer Peta Murgatroyd has had enough with mommy shamers on Instagram.
“Mommy shaming is huge today. The other day, on Instagram, [commenters] were saying I looked too skinny, but I’ve actually put on 8 lbs.,” Murgatroyd, who welcomed son Shai Aleksander Chmerkovskiy in January 2017, told PEOPLE. “You’re too skinny or you’re too fat. You can’t win.”
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Murgatroyd was criticized online for returning to DWTS so soon after Shai was born. After she saw the first comments pop up on her Instagram page, she learned to shrug them off over time.
“I read [the comments], but it doesn’t really affect me anymore because I know that I’m a very hands-on mom,” Murgatroyd said. “I know that I’m always there for him and it was five hours out of my day that I didn’t see him.”
However, she did feel some guilt whenever she missed Shai, but she knew she would have “gone a little crazy” if she never left the house.
Murgatroyd told PEOPLE she and her husband, fellow DWTS pro Maksim Chmerkovskiy, would love to have another child. The only problem is their schedules are a little busy.
“I don’t know when that’s gonna happen with our schedules, but probably in six months’ time,” the 32-year-old dancer said. “I don’t want to leave it too late.”
In another interview with Entertainment Tonight last month, Murgatroyd said she has always wanted to have a big family, since she grew up in a small family.
“I’ve always wanted to have a big family. I came from a pretty small one that was scattered all over the world, so to come into a Russian household like this one – I sort of just claimed about 50 family members, so it’s great,” she said.
Murgatroyd also told Entertainment Tonight that Shai has since gotten used to his parent’s busy work schedule.
“He doesn’t just burst into tears. He is like, ‘Oh, Mom and Dad are actually going. OK, they’re going to come and see me tomorrow,’” Murgatroyd said.
Murgatroyd and Chmerkovskiy celebrated their one-year anniversary in July. The couple shared videos of the moment they exchanged vows in New York City. They began dating in 2012 and got engaged in December 2015.
The Chmerkovskiy family will be growing soon, even before the couple has another baby. Chmerkovskiy’s brother Val and Jenna Johnson, who also also both DWTS pros, got engaged in June.
DWTS returns on ABC on Sept. 27. Murgatroyd and Chmerkovskiy are not part of the main pro roster, but Val and Johnson are.
Photo credit: Instagram/Peta Murgatroyd
