cardio – Regaining Lost Aspects: Mind and Soul

March 15, 2018

Beginning and End to All Pregnancies

Last week on the morning of March 8th making me exactly 39 weeks pregnant we had an unexpected arrival!!! Our third baby was born after 10 hours of labor, which is the longest labor I have had. Now here is the kicker…. she arrived at 9 lbs and 1 oz…. Here are the pictures of the beginning and end to each of my pregnancies.

The top two pictures are from my first pregnancy, the second two are from my second, and the third set of two is from my last one.

In the top picture is the first and last picture from my second and third pregnancies in a front view. So as you can see from all of the pictures I started with more abs and was fitter with my third and was able to stay as fit as I could making my stomach look a bit smaller than it had with my other pregnancies. I really thought that this last baby would be smaller too, but apparently I was completely wrong. Our first baby was exactly 7 lbs and was only 19 1/4th inches long. Our second baby was 8 lbs 5 oz and 20 1/2 inches long. and This last baby was a whole 9 lbs 1 oz and 20 inches long….. At the end of my first pregnancy I had gained 25 lbs, at the end of my second I had gained 16 lbs, and at the end of my third I had gained 30 lbs.

Below is a picture that shows pretty well the size of each of the babies compared to me after they were born.

Angela was our first baby born only 2 days before I turned 40 weeks, Sarah our second born at exactly 39 weeks, and Dawn is our third and last born also at exactly 39 weeks. All born healthy. The only issues we had was Angela had a little jaundice, but not enough to bring home a blanket and we didn’t have to keep her in the hospital and Dawn had just a little issue with her blood sugar levels dropping since she was so big, but we were able to take her home after only one day 🙂

It seems that with each pregnancy that I worked out more each baby grew bigger than the last inside of me. My first pregnancy I only walked, my second pregnancy I only ran, and this last pregnancy I did weighted work outs and for my cardio I did running/biking or the elliptical/ stairs depending on the weather.

Below are my cardio logs from when we first found out we were pregnant on July 4th to the end of the pregnancy.

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Now onto recovery for 6 weeks before I can start all over with trying to build myself up physically again, but happily I hopefully won’t have to start all over again in the future since this was our last pregnancy 🙂 I’m excited to finally have my body back and am super blessed and happy that I was able to birth three beautiful healthy baby girls over the span of the last almost 6 years. And with that my pregnancy fitness journey posts will end.

November 13, 2017

The Time Has Come (20 + 22 Weeks Pregnancy Comparisons)

Well now is sadly the time that I was hoping was never going to come. It is time for me to start backing off a little on my working out/exercising. These last few weeks I have felt way too emotional, depressed, and exhausted. It is getting to the point where I can’t even make it through the day without breaking down and crying and wanting to just lay on the floor and pass out. Even during working out or running lately I’ve stopped now more often than not to cry my eyes out cause of having such a hard time trying to finish. I know that I shouldn’t be this exhausted and tired during just the end of my second trimester. This is supposed to be the happy trimester where I feel great and energized again until the last one hits me. At first I thought that it may just be hormones that are causing me to be way too emotional and making it so I can’t hold myself together, but when I thought more into it I realized that my body is just not wanting to carry itself, and if my body is having this hard of a time functioning right now, I’m worried about the health of the baby.

This is hard for me to do because I am so used to pushing myself to my breaking point, and that is what I have been doing lately, but I have another life in me to worry and think about. This is the most I have done with any of my pregnancies. Some days sometimes more than three times a week consists of hour and a half long workouts that are the same as I was doing before I got pregnant. I had it in my head wrongly that I should be progressing just like I usually do when I push myself during exercise. Usually you get better and stronger, and it is hard to wrap your head around the fact that when you are pregnant you slowly digress and things get harder. I was doing so good for so long that I honestly wasn’t expecting the time to slow down to come so soon. I know I need to be easier on myself mentally because it is just part of the process, but it is hard when I’m always in such desperation to reach my goals and to be the best I can be, which sometimes I know that the me I want to be can be unrealistic. Multiple times my husband has told me that I’m going to kill myself with how much I’m trying to do at one time and how much I push myself. But I realize that my ultimate dream and goal is to be the best mother I can be, so I need to back off for now until my baby’s life isn’t in the brink. I want my body to be able to give her everything she needs and I need to be in a healthier happier state of mind especially with the holidays coming up so I can be the mother I need to be for my other two kids and for the baby when the time comes. Pushing myself to exhaustion and getting upset at myself for not seeing progress isn’t going to help anyone at all, least of all myself. Our baby’s life is more important to me than my desperation to not look like a failure and to feel some kind of success and self worth.

So I’m slowly going to back down. For example after my hour long workout today I ran 2 miles instead of 3.5, which I don’t mind at all since it is starting to get freezing out making it harder to run anyway. Depending on the day and what my body tells me will depend on how I take my workouts. I might cut my hour ones in half or my biking or running mileage down on some days. Other days that I have half an hour workouts I’m probably going to do the whole workout and cardio routine like I have been if I feel up to it, until I hit near the end of my pregnancy and know I need to cut way down. I’m beginning to see that maybe P90x and 21Day Fix Extreme and Core De Force may not be the best to do when you are 36 weeks pregnant. I will just pay more attention and listen to my body and give my body what it needs when that time comes like I am deciding to do now.

Here are my comparisons for week 20 in all my pregnancies and week 22 in all my pregnancies. We will see if I manage to keep up with the staying more fit this time around like I have been, which may be possible since I am still and still plan to do more in the fitness department than my other two pregnancies even with backing down a little.

Week 20

Week 22

As you can tell in my arms in the second set of pictures that I am way more muscular than I was in previous pregnancies. The picture of me in the blue shirt right above is from my second pregnancy and my arms just look so small to me compared to now. so weight lifting and push ups and things like that that I have been doing has definitely helped with keeping the muscles there.

September 12, 2017September 12, 2017

My Pregnant Workout Schedule

Being a stay at home mom and not having the freedom to really leave the house and go to the gym since my husband never really knows what his day to day work schedule is going to be and sometimes ends up being gone days at a time sucks, but I make the best with what I can. One of the best programs I have bought and continue to use has been Beach Body on Demand. I’m not trying to sell it. I’m not a salesperson or coach or whatever for the company. I am just stating that in the past two years I have used it it has been very beneficial. There are so many different levels of programs to choose from fitness wise that it has let me gradually increase my fitness levels since I’ve started it after my last pregnancy and it lets me try out different types of workout routines and instructors to see what works best for me and what I like. This above is the workout schedule I have made for myself combining and switching between three different beach body programs. The programs I have chosen are P90X, 21 Day Fix Extreme, and Core De Force.

Reasons I picked these programs

P90X– This program I have completed before for the whole 90 days without missing a single workout. I wanted to challenge myself this pregnancy and see if I could keep up with it.

21 Day Fix Extreme– Another program I have completed more than once. I chose this one over 21 Day Fix because I felt like this one was more at my level and more challenging. The biggest reason I chose it though was because I wanted at least two days a week to have only a thirty minute workout so I didn’t tire or stress myself out too much with always having lack of time while being pregnant.

Core De Force– I had never done this program yet and wanted to try something new. A friend of mine said that the workouts are pretty much pregnant safe and it would give me the chance to work on my core without putting too much stress on the baby.

The reason why I switch around with the three is to keep myself from getting bored these next nine months. You may ask why I don’t just switch to a different program if I get bored, but the further along you get in pregnancy the harder the workouts become to do so I want to prevent trying something new and hurting myself. I want my body to grow accustomed to the programs I have down so that I can keep up as much as possible later on and know when I need to start modifying more or not. Right now I’m not needing to modify too much. There are some exercises I refuse to do like superman- banana to keep too much stress from my uterus and there are a few exercises I modify if I start feeling too out of it like burpees, but I have already gotten stronger this last month and have been able to do the original exercise instead of the modified version like I had to my first go around with a few. I am well aware that that will change though the further along I get in the pregnancy. So I will keep doing this schedule sequence. Once I get to the bottom I will continue to write out the sequence how it has been, which has been nice so I’m not doing the same workouts by each other since each program has a different number of workout routines.

On Top Of That

Besides just this workout schedule I continue to also do my cardio. Which is a lot simpler of a schedule. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays I run 3.5 miles, unless I am unable to then I run 20 mins stairs. On Tuesdays and Thursdays I bike 7 miles, unless I am unable to then I do 30 mins on my mobile elliptical. I have stopped running every day like I used to because my knees started having a hard time with the constant heavy impact routines. So that’s why I now also bike to have a lower impact cardio in my schedule to save my knees so I can continue what workouts I want to for many more years to come.