Portland Thorns’ Bella Bixby on returning to play after motherhood: ‘It changes your body’

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Bella Bixby entered Snapdragon Stadium Saturday night the same way she has entered every stadium for weeks — not just as Portland Thorns’ starting goalkeeper but also mom to toddler Ruby, who was perched happily between her right arm and hip.

For the 29-year-old, the 2025 NWSL season has been more than just returning to the field after the offseason. It has been a balancing act between being an elite athlete and a new mother — a transformation she does not sugarcoat.

“It changes your body,” she tells The Athletic. “I think I underestimated how much pregnancy was gonna change my body.”

Planning for a family was not a simple process for Bixby, especially with limited guarantees in her sport. That uncertainty lingered through the entire 2023 season, even before she started trying to get pregnant. After 14 years with her husband, Elliot, she knew it was time, but making the decision was hard. Her teammate Crystal Dunn just returned to play after having her son, Marcel. Another former teammate, Iceland’s Dagny Brindisdóttir, who had a son at the time, was also able to come back to the team.

Despite these role models, she was still unsure. “I was anxious about what it might mean for my career,” she explains. “Will I come back? Can I even do it? Is this going to be my last season?”

A Portland native and an Oregon State alumnus, Bixby was drafted by the Thorns in 2017. After loan spells in Germany and Israel, she made her NWSL debut for the Thorns in the 2020 NWSL Challenge Cup – only to suffer an ACL injury and be sidelined for the rest of the tournament.

She returned in 2021 with a statement, setting an NWSL record for most consecutive shutout minutes (269) across her first three games, and earned a spot as one of three finalists for Goalkeeper of the Year that same year. In 2022, she helped lead the Thorns to an NWSL championship. The Thorns offered her a contract extension through 2025 (with an option for 2026), signaling the club’s belief in her continued impact, especially following her return from maternity leave in 2024.

Bella Bixby helped the Portland Thorns to an NWSL championship in 2022. (Katharine Lotze / Getty Images)

The NWSL’s new collective bargaining agreement (CBA), which included protections for mothers and extended support for families, gave Bixby more confidence that having a family earlier in her career was possible.

“The new CBA changed everything,” Bixby says. “It’s not just about me — it allows my husband to travel with us, so we don’t have to be apart during these early years with Ruby.”

But physically returning to play wasn’t as simple for Bixby.

“People think it’s nine months and then you’re done. But it is a much longer commitment on your body,” she says. “My center of gravity changed, my hips are different, everything is different.”

Before pregnancy, as an elite athlete, she felt there was nothing her body could not overcome with some rehab, hard work and time. But pregnancy and nursing affected her ligaments and joints, crucial parts of her body as a goalkeeper.

“There’s a hormone that is in your body in high amounts when you’re pregnant, it’s called Relaxin,” Bixby explains. While it prepares the body for childbirth by relaxing ligaments, especially in the pelvis, it’s not ideal for a goalkeeper’s body. Relaxin does not immediately go away after childbirth either, especially if the mother decides to nurse.

“By the time we get to October of this year, it’ll have been two years since my body really has reset hormonally, which is insane to think about,” Bixby says. “You really only think about pregnancy as a nine-month commitment to your body, but it’s not.”

Since Ruby’s arrival, it’s not just her body that’s changed; her entire routine has, too.

“I don’t know what I did with all my time before,” Bixby laughs. While she calls Ruby the greatest gift, she doesn’t downplay the reality of how motherhood has transformed her life.

“I used to sleep in till 10,” she says with a smirk. “Now I’m up at six or seven —whenever Ruby is. I used to come home from training and just… decompress. Now I’m chasing a toddler.”

Even with the upheaval, she still carves out time for recovery, nutrition, and sleep, all the non-negotiables of an elite athlete.

Bixby is one of several NWSL players who have recently become mothers or are currently expecting. In February, Washington Spirit and U.S. women’s national team midfielder Andi Sullivan announced that she and husband Drew Skundrich are expecting a baby girl. Bixby’s teammate and U.S. forward Sophia Wilson announced she is having a baby with her husband, Arizona Cardinals’ Michael Wilson. And last week, Chicago Stars and USWNT forward Mallory Swanson announced she is expecting a child.

While there might not officially be a best window of time for an athlete to get pregnant, this year has its perks, especially for the national team players between major tournaments. Bixby thinks that if there is a sweet spot, it is different for every player. She says the best is to come back in time to be cleared for preseason. “That’ll dictate when you want to get pregnant,” she explains.

As more players announce pregnancies, Bixby sees the ripple effects of the league’s evolving support for mothers. It’s not just about what happens on the field anymore, it’s about who’s standing beside it.

For her, this dual identity is a badge of honor, but she is still getting used to being the mom on the team.

“There is a misconception that motherhood changes you so much that you have to give up what you’re passionate about,” she says. “ But this is our passion, and our dream. Some people, I’m sure, motherhood changes things for them. In my case, the moment I was pregnant, I was already picturing what it was going to look like to come back.”

(Top photo: Troy Wayrynen / Imagn Images)

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