After pregnancy, and sometimes very early on, I see a lot of women hell bent on returning to a vigorous training program ASAP, as they try to re-gain their pre-baby body back, often through rigidity and intense structure………….
Is this the best way………?
Well it might work for some, but for the most part it won’t work.
This is a time of your life, when you’re going to be exhausted, and the reality is, that your body still hasn’t recovered from the vigours of birthing. And now it’s running on very little sleep, as you get up and down throughout the night to feed your baby.
Breastfeeding may lead to increased hunger and certainly isn’t done to a timer, so you may find yourself stuck to the couch for hours on end with a feeding baby!!! (Best time to read that book youv’e been meaning too for a while though…)
Your baby will be demanding your full attention, and you may start to find yourself becoming physically and emotionally drained, as you try to be the perfect mother and partner, and still try to pretend you look human lol.
SO would this be the time to start punishing yourself with unrealistic exercise goals, and enforcing structure into your day, by way of a set exercise routing?
I say NO.
If you set yourself a HUGE goal, and try and commit to a full and robust exercise program, throughout the week, your’e more likely than not, to set yourself up for failure. As our bodies are just not ready for that level of exertion and structure. And we all have this vision of how our pre-pregnancy bodies looked like, but the reality is, for most, our bodies will never look the same again! Its natural for your hips to widen through pregnancy, as the baby needs room to grow and move through the birth canal during labour. Some of us don’t have the best elasticity in our skin, so we will end up will stretch marks and skin that is no longer taut. Our breasts change shape, and so the list goes on…………
So why would we be trying to fight against these changes, that show we have now moved into a different stage of our life?
Why would we not be embracing these changes, and working with our new bodies in a different way? Because they still have the capacity to be beautiful, they might just be different, and not how we’re used to seeing ourselves.
I say this is the time when you start to take it slowly, taking your baby for long walks, especially in a baby carrier to increase bonding time. Add in hill walking or stairs when your body feels up to it. Go to a specifically designed yoga class for new mums, or other exercise classes where new mums are welcomed and taught the appropriate exercises for this time in their post- partum recovery. Find a REP’s registered trainer who can design a home program for you, that is short in duration (20 minutes), so that you can start with some basic exercises that are going to rebuild your core strength and pelvic floor muscles, but won’t leave you feeling like you’ve run a marathon xx
But you know what, If your day turns to custard, and you don’t make it out for some exercise, who cares!
You’re still a mum, first and foremost, and you have to put the needs of your baby first. And expecially your own ability to cope with the added stress of a workout, when your body may be exhausted from an all nighter off feeding or teething babies.
If you need to stop in the middle of a workout to feed your baby, then that’s just what needs to be done.
Don’t beat yourself up over all the exercsie that you may not be getting, but feel proud of every little bit that you do get in, as it’s all helping to rebuid your body, and gain your confidence back xx And remember this stage does not last for long……
This is the time when you need to go with the flow, be kind too your body and allow yourself to let go of the structure thats attached to your old way off being. There’s plenty of time for that later, but right now is not that time xxx
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