Q: Going from being so athletic, strict with your nutrition, and being able to train as hard as you want, pregnancy must have been huge adjustment. How did your training regimen change throughout the course of the 9-months?
Liz, It was a HUGE adjustment for me. It might be easier if I break the pregnancy down by weeks. For anyone who may read this and doesn't know, pregnancy is considered a 40 week period. The first 15 weeks I was exhausted many days. So exhausted that I told my husband, on more than one occasion, that I had to take a nap immediately after I would take my morning shower. I have never been that exhausted consistently in my entire life. But still I tried to workout at least 4-5 days per week for the first 15 weeks. My cardio and my weight lifting routine remained about the same during that time period. And then around week 15-18 things started to change for me. Now, I must also add that every pregnancy is quite unique and every woman responds differently to her changing hormone levels. At this time for me my hips began to ache quite a bit and by week 18 I had gained approximately 12-15 extra pounds. Obviously your hormones change a lot when you are pregnant, but those hormones caused things to happen to me that I certainly was not expecting. For starters, my hips, knees, and ankles have never caused problems for me before. That's when I learned about the hormone called, "relaxin." This is the hormone responsible for loosening up the pelvic ligaments in preparation for delivery, but it doesn't just loosen that area alone, it also loosens the joints making my body ache in places that have never ached before. Relaxin makes a pregnant women a bit more susceptible to injury and unfortunately this hormone doesn't normally level out until on average 6 months after childbirth. Also, those lovely pregnancy hormones cause your metabolism to slow down... yep, slow wayyy down, despite the fact that you are now growing a little person inside yourself. Pregnancy is just cruel like that or at least, it was for me. I tried to continue to workout through week 20 and I did, but I started to dread my workouts. You see, working out no longer felt good. My joints were aching. I was 
gaining weight to the point of beginning to feel uncomfortable no matter what type of workout I would do. I tried to enjoy my workouts but for the first time in my life, I hated them, and I hated the fact that I was slowly losing every bit of my athleticism. I decided if I continued making myself workout, during this time that I obviously hated working out, I may honestly grow to hate working out completely for the rest of my life. So I quit. I quit for several reasons. The first reason was for Lucas. I had to stop focusing on the athleticism that up until this point in my life had always been my ultimate passion. I had this new amazing gift that was growing within my body and I needed to stop, and focus on being grateful for this amazing new life. I decided I would pick up my old hobby and passion again after Lucas was born. From week 20 through week 40 I only worked out maybe 4 or 5 more times total. I didn't even go to the gym to walk on a treadmill. Let's just say I've never been the best at moderation.Q: A lot of times women will gain well over the recommended amount with their pregnancy. How did you keep your eating under control? Did you experience a lot of ‘bad cravings’?
Many people who are into fitness, including myself, have at least some degree of control issues. It's not always a bad thing. We like to be in control of our bodies. We have fun setting challenges and goals for ourselves and we love seeing those results. But pregnancy is interesting. Pregnancy to some degree takes the control away from you. Pregnancy and those hormones do things to your body that you absolutely can not control. I said many times while I was pregnant, "For the first in my life, I feel like I have no control over my body." To a certain degree this is very true and I did not like that part at all. However, if I had given in to every single craving and just gave up on eating healthy, I'm sure I could have gained much more weight. The doctor recommended weight gain for a person with a beginning healthy weight is between 25-35 extra pounds. On the day I went into labor I had gained a total of 37 pounds and I did have to fight those cravings throughout pregnancy in order to keep my weight gain that low. It was a challenge to say the least. I did eat very healthy for the most part, just more daily calories and more variety of healthy foods. But yes, I had some crazy intense cravings throughout the course of the entire pregnancy. Most of the time I tried to avoid giving in, but occasionally I just had to completely indulge so the cravings did not become much worse.
Q: Some people love being pregnant and some women hate it. How would you describe your overall pregnancy experience?
I HATED PREGNANCY. And yes, it is possible to HATE pregnancy and at the same time LOVE the new life growing within your body. If you hate pregnancy, do not allow other crazy women to make you feel guilty for your feelings. Pregnancy sucked, but the end result is the GREATEST blessing EVER. I felt fat, bloated, overwhelmingly tired, non-athletic, bloated, and the furtherest thing from sexy... and did I mention fat? When the sciatica kicked in around week 15, I felt like an 90 year old woman and I had the limp to go along with it. Nothing quite like comparing yourself to an 90 year old woman to make you feel SEXY. I did also compare myself to a cow a few times... the cow comparison made me feel SUPER DUPER SEXY.Q: The first time you were able to work out/go to the gym after giving birth to Lucas, how did you feel?
One word: OVERWHELMED. That's how I felt the first time I ran outside 13 days after Lucas' birth. I mean, don't get me wrong, it felt great to finally have him OUTSIDE of my body and the day he was born was one of the BEST days of my entire life, but I still had A LOT of weight to lose. And I had clearly lost A LOT of strength and muscle from not working out the last 20 weeks of the pregnancy. I was no where near my pre-pregnancy athletic condition. But you know, I actually looked forward to the challenge of bringing it all back. I never doubted that I could get my pre-pregnancy body back- but it was COMPLETELY overwhelming at first. Three months later I was back to my pre-pregnancy weight and three and a half months later, I had my pre-pregnant athletic body back and visually could not tell that I even had a baby. Do not listen to any woman who claims that you will never see your pre-pregnancy body again. Those women unfortunately just don't know any better. However, let me be very clear that the results did not come easy for me: I had to work my butt off for my accomplishments.
Q: Did you feel any insecurities or pressure to go immediately back to your old body after giving birth?
Did I feel any insecurities or pressure to immediately go back to my old body? No. But you can not be in the athletic condition that I was in pre-pregnancy carrying that much extra weight and having lost that much muscle. It is physically impossible. I did not feel any insecurities or pressure. What I felt was a burning desire to have my old athleticism back in it's entirety. A side effect of getting that athleticism back was getting my old body back. I am not in love with fitness from a vanity perspective - I'm in love with fitness because I love being and feeling like an athlete.
Q: A lot of times, mom’s will make excuses or feel that they are too busy now to work out and focus on getting healthy again. What advice would you give them?
Emily no longer works as a Personal Trainer, but she is still glad to give advise and/or recommend a Personal Trainer in your area. Contact her here.
0 comments:
Post a Comment