Pregnant workout buddies

It's become more and more humorous for me at the gym, as I get bigger.  Firstly, my outfits have taken on a new level of 'special' this past month.  I have outgrown my workout bottoms and because there's not much time left in my pregnancy, I decided to just borrow Adam's big basketball shorts.  My tops have also become too short, so I've been using baggy race t shirts, both mine and Adams.  That, combined with my compression socks, makes for a lovely ensemble.  I find people look at my face, immediately glance at my belly and then look away quickly so they don't get caught staring.  It's even better when I'm with Silvana because then it's twice the belly, twice the strange looks.

We have been meeting about once/week at the gym for years and have just continued on right through our pregnancies.  Today might be our last prenatal gym date and it was fairly comical.

 

Today our favourite elliptical machines were either broken or in use, so we used the other ellipticals until a few minutes in when Silvana's foot went numb.  So we switched to walking on the treadmill.  My pace and incline were too much for this very pregnant body and my lower abdominals started aching after 15 min. So we switched to spin bikes until both our girly parts were completely numb.  Then our favorite ellipticals were free so we finished off with a few minutes there, until Silvana's foot numbness set in again.

We laughed through the workout, as it is getting harder to find things we can both comfortably do.

The best part of our workouts is always the long stretching session afterwards, which mostly involves talking and awkwardly rolling out our pregnant bodies on the blue foam roller. Thanks Silvana for the good times!

The girl working at the gym's front desk was apparently talking about me to the manager because when I walked in she said, "there's the girl I was telling you about who is due any day now and is going to have her baby at the gym."  I laughed and said, "and you're going to deliver it right.  They train you for that kind of stuff don't they?"

My kids are bursting with excitement about their new baby sister.  Yesterday they made cards for her that they placed in her crib and today they made her some "toys" out of play-doh.

Kyla's disappointment this morning when she discovered baby hadn't come in the night was so sweet.  She cried and was very glum during breakfast.  It's tender for me to experience this pregnancy and the excitement through my children's eyes.  Kyla has been asking me all day, "are the tightenings getting stronger momma?"  She likes to feel my belly and how it gets firm when it tightens.  She also loves to move my bellly around in circles and say, "you're belly is like jelly momma."  Riley is more gentle and loves to gently hug his baby sister.  They both keep telling her to, "come out soon baby."

Baby time...maybe.

Well, here I sit at home, passing the afternoon while my kids are in school.  I had a stretch and sweep this morning, so I have been crampy all afternoon and am thinking my baby might enter the world soon....or not.  But it's a very real possibility now.  I try not to think overly about her method of entry. I mean really, how DOES a woman's body DO THAT.  It's so much nicer to just think of it as something simple and beautiful like a flower blooming or something.  Lol.  Joking aside though, I have so much awe and respect for the body as Gods supreme creation and I trust in the incredible processes that are soon to take place.

I just read through some old posts of races I've done and it was almost like reading about someone else's life.  Maybe it's in part because I've taken a break from racing the second half of this pregnancy but it feels like a bit of a distant memory.

That being said, each race is still a part of who I am.  Each experience we have changes us forever.  The real power in any experience of life is who we become from that experience.  Through racing I have learned to pace myself mentally and physically, to manage pain, to break hard things down into smaller pieces in my mind, to have short and long term goals, to have fun and enjoy myself, even when things are hard and that I am not a failure when things don't turn out as I had hoped.  The preparation for races has taught me that worry doesn't help me at all, so no point doing it.  That fear is a lie and to just tell those fearful thoughts, "we'll see."  That I create the future in my mind before I ever have a chance of creating it in reality.  That I am a strong, capable woman and can do hard things.

I'm counting on all these lessons to help me in this impending experience of delivering my baby girl.

Wish me luck and if you are so inclined, keep me in your prayers that all will go well.

The lesson of the varicose veins.

You know how sometimes you learn something, either while sitting in a church class, reading a book or just talking to friends and it's one of those "aha" moments? Where the message reaches down deeper than usually, strikes a chord and opens up your mind and heart to some new truth.

Then there's the harder won lessons, that come from getting your hands dirty...

The lessons that are the results of a life experience.  The prize taken from passing through something difficult or new...that takes time to learn.  These truths tend to sink a little deeper.  They reach deep inside and introduce us to ourselves.

My varicose veins have been a catalyst for one of these introductions.

Now, I know there are many health problems much more ominous and threatening than varicose veins.  I also know that if I had something worse, that would become my new lesson and I would care a lot less about these darn veins.

Please don't judge me for how much my veins bother me, I am human and a work in progress after all.

So when I look down at my legs and see this, it's hard for me.

It's hard for me to see my body change, as part of my sacrifice offered in having this child.  But I am learning, through time and talking to others, how to put this sacrifice into perspective.  I am being introduced anew to a part of myself that values motherhood immensely.

These legs that have swam, biked and ran through miles and miles of terrain are now straining to give life to my little girl.  I am grateful for all that my body has done and for what it is doing right now.

I guess the lesson I'm learning is this:
What good is a body if it's only function is to look good?  (Well, some would say, that's enough for them.)  It's not enough for me.  This body I've been given is a tool.  A gift.  A precious gift from a loving Heavenly Father and I get to choose what I do with it.  As I use it to do good, there will be a cost to my body.  It's inevitable.  I choose to make that trade, even when it's hard.  That's the lesson I'm learning and that's the introduction to myself that I'm experiencing.

Holidays

I wanted to post a little about our holidays.  Adam had 2.5 weeks off work, so we had lots of family time this year.  I was about 7 months pregnant but still feeling good, so we were able to get outside and do some fun things together.  Cross country skiing, sledding skating, building snow forts etc.
I do sometimes make the mistake of thinking that I can do anything with this body.  Two on two basketball with Adam, my dad and my brother reminded me that it's easier to strain these stretched out abdominal muscles.  An Insanity video reminded me that jumping around isn't the best thing for me at this stage.  No serious injuries from either, just a bit more sore than I'd like to be at this stage.  We pushed back our day to go skiing, so that I could make sure I was recovered from the basketball.

After a two hour wait in line, the kids got to see Santa 

The other big excitement for our family was that Dallin and Marie got married!  My little brother is all grown up.

I know I've blogged before about pregnancy dreams.  Well, a few nights ago I woke up and I had lifted the lamp shade off the lamp on the nightstand.  While holding it and wondering what to do, I called out, "Adam".  Then I realized, I probably didn't need his help with this, set the shade down and went back to sleep.  So. Very.  Strange.

I've also been preparing items for my home birth.  Yep, I'm gonna try to deliver at home.  Just to make other people uncomfortable.  I like what one comedian said when he told others that his wife was delivering at home.  They would respond, "oh, we thought about doing that, but we wanted our baby to live."  But really, I have great trust in the skills of my midwives and the seton hospital is a five min drive if there's any reason to be there.

I'm enjoying my workouts at the gym and can be seen there about four times a week doing low impact cardio and weights.  Look for the tall pregnant girl in the sweet compression socks.  I think I kind of stand out.  This Friday, Adam and I are going to play squash and go for a swim because he has the day off work and the kids are in school for the morning.  Yes, this could be another case of me thinking this pregnant body can do anything I ask it to...we'll see how it goes.  I am grateful for how much good nutrition and exercise have helped me through this and my other two pregnancies.

Some little thoughts about THOUGHTS.

I like to put little notes up on my bathroom mirror once in awhile.   I've had this one up for awhile and I've left it up because it remains helpful to me;

"You get what you think about, whether you want it or not."

Found that little nugget in a book by Wayne Dyer, whom I love.
I read a study awhile ago where they analyzed data on the location of highway traffic accidents.  In the study, they found a high percentage of accidents occurred where people crashed into utility poles. Much higher than it should have been statistically.  Why would this happen?  Well, you can imagine that many of these drivers were likely thinking, "don't hit the pole, don't hit the pole, don't hit the pole."

A few weeks ago Kyla had a little surgery on her ears.

A couple nights after the surgery I was talking with her before bed.  I said, "Kyla, you'll probably find tomorrow that your ears don't hurt anymore.  They are getting so much better now, so you probably won't feel pain anymore."  I mentioned to Adam about our little conversation and he laughed because he had said pretty much exactly the same thing to her before saying goodnight to her.  And guess what?  The next morning she woke up happy and said she didn't need or want medicine.  Yes, yes, I know that timing was part of this, as her ears truly were healing but I believe her thoughts were a more powerful part.

I remember when I nursed my two babies, I loved to read at the same time.  Might as well multi task, right?  I remember on multiple occasions I would read something that made me feel good and all of a sudden my milk would start flowing like a fire hose and my baby would have to come off for air.  If good, positive thoughts effect my milk supply like that , then what else are they doing to my physical body.  I believe there are powerful, unseen physical changes that occur in our bodies when we fill our minds with good thoughts.

I was speaking with my midwife at my last appt about how my previous experiences preparing mentally for some big races have helped prepare me to have this baby.  I told her that I've learned how unhelpful 'worry' is.  I've learned that it really does nothing good for me.  Sure, it's good to be aware of difficult things that are coming and to proactively prepare for them, but 'worry'....all that has done is cripple me.  I have learned that I perform best in races when I trust my body and relax into it, which is the same with labour and probably a lot of other things in life.

Daddy Daughter Time.

I'm 29 weeks pregnant now!  Rocking my compression socks, oh yeah!

Once a week my dad and I spend time together.  When the weather was nice and earlier in my pregnancy, we went for runs down in fish creek together.  I'm done with running as of a couple weeks ago (hurt my foot and concerned about the impact on my veins), so we meet at the gym to spin together.

Today was fun.  Something you should know about my dad is that he doesn't like to interrupt his workouts for anything, yep he's kind of intense like that (you wonder where I get it from right?!?).  It's more of a comical intensity though because for my dad most things have a comical aspect.  So today he was wearing two pairs of shorts and he started getting warm, so he asked, "do you think I can take off my outer pair of shorts while spinning?"  It was said with a sly grin, as if asking me to dare him to it.  Of course I obliged and then laughed my head off as he kept choppily spinning, while the first leg awkwardly came out, followed by the next.  You see the guy in the picture next to my dad?  Yeah, he had that face during the shorts removal too.

Last week was even more fun.  We were on the upright bikes, rather than the granny recumbent bikes pictured above.  We were on a random interval setting.  It was intense and I got right to it, whereas my dad likes to take his time warming up.  About 5 min into the workout, he noticed that I had burned a lot more calories and gone "further" than him.  So he told me that he was going to catch me.  Well, I couldn't resist the lure of competition so I sped up as well and raised my gears with his.

We were both sweating like crazy and unfortunately for my dad, he had forgotten his sweat towel.  Having minimal bodily function phobias, he asked if he could share my sweat towel.  "No way" I responded.  "That would be like sharing your toothbrush or your toilet paper or something.  I just can't handle it.  Sorry."  So his shirt became his sweat towel and as time progressed it became a very soaked shirt.  On the competition went, both of us suffering and egging each other on, in our friendly, fun, loving way.

Then came another setback for my dad.  He needed to blow his nose quite badly.  Tragic.  So I told him it was ok, he could just get off and I would win by forfeit.  He wasn't having any of that so he proceeded to blow his nose IN HIS SHIRT.  Then he looked down and said, "wow, now that's really gross!"  So before I could stop him he took off his shirt and kept biking topless.  I'm guessing back in the 80's it was cool for men to strut around the gym topless.  I commented that I thought he might get a reprimanding, exposing himself like that, and so he put the sweaty, mucousy shirt back on.  Awesome.

We finished the workout and I honestly can't even remember who won the competition.

I love you dad.  I enjoy our workouts together every week.  Thanks for keeping it real.

Pregnancy Tips

I thought I'd share a few pregnancy tips.  Not that I'm some guru or anything but these are just some things I've been thinking about that have been helpful to me and maybe they could be helpful to you.

• Don't compare yourself to other pregnant women.  Be kind to yourself and to others by giving each woman the respect and space to let their body do what it needs to do.

• Build up your storage of vitamins and minerals before you even get pregnant by taking a multi or prenatal vitamin daily.  I had my iron levels tested a couple years ago.  I was low so I took extra supplements for a few months and had it re-tested, to get my levels into a good place.  My iron levels have been awesome this pregnancy and I haven't felt as tired as I did my last two pregnancies.  I think once your levels are low, it's really tough to get them up during pregnancy with that precious little leech in your womb.  

• Along the same lines, I really believe in taking a good quality prenatal vitamin.  It's been proven that different brands of vitamins have much different absorption rates.  My naturopath recommended the Douglas labs "Pure" brand, which are relatively inexpensive.  I also take an extra omega 3 (for baby's brain development), zinc (cure for preventing anal fissures - a whole other story, which I'm happy to share if you're interested) and calcium/magnesium (because then I don't get any leg cramps).

• Sweat pants are your friend but you'll probably feel like a slob if you wear them everyday...I know I did. I felt more attractive when I started mixing in some jeans, makeup and doing my hair, even though sweats still have a dear place in my heart and in my wardrobe...with leggings following as a close second.

• Don't make pregnancy an excuse to eat crap all the time.  I've seen others do this, put on obscene amounts of weight and then they have to work so hard afterwards to get back to feeling good.  I do believe that some bodies will just tend to put on more weight in pregnancy, no matter how you eat (and you shouldn't beat yourself up if that's what your body tends to do because you should trust your body knows what it's doing) but don't make the damage worse by treating pregnancy like a nine month cheat day.  Not only for the weight gain issue but also for your and your baby's health...Nourish Yourself!

• Take time to rest.  Took me awhile to learn this when I was pregnant with Riley because I viewed sloth with the highest disdain and felt guilty if I wasn't productive all...the....time.  But I learned that wasn't serving me well and that, just as a worked muscle needs time to recover and rebuilt stronger, our whole bodies, as well as our minds and emotions need rest, in order to be well and balanced.  I find that I need at least one or two afternoons a week to rest (read, nap, whatever)

Spin Class

Today I did a spin class at the gym with my dad.  He's been coming with me to the gym about once a week to spend time together before baby comes.  It's been fun.

It was a one hour class but for some reason, they've decided to put the clock on the wall right at the front of the room.  That means that I am checking it, oh about every 10 seconds, and the time kind of drags on.

Today I was thinking about how I used to train for hours on end in preparation for Ironman.  How did I survive that, not just physically, but mentally!  An average training week had three spin sessions (along with three swim sessions and three run sessions).  One of the sessions was a long base training session, so I'd often be required to spin for 4-5 hours at a time.  Of course I tried to get outside on my road bike for those sessions but that wasn't always possible due to weather or child care.

So I spent hours upon hours on the corner spin bike.  Spin classes would come and go from the room, my friend Silvana would sometimes come and go but I remained..there...on the bike....in the corner of the room.....for HOURS.  

I'm so proud of that Kimmy who stuck with her goal and even enjoyed it, for the most part.  On a side note, my former self looks so skinny to my pregnant eyes but really everyone looks incredibly skinny to me right now.  It's kind of funny.

I truly am enjoying this stage of my fitness.  It's been nice to take a big step back from the intensity and just exercise for health, not for any goal or race.  I have struggled with what to actually do at the gym these days since I injured my foot a couple weeks ago and I've also been concerned about avoiding unnecessary further damage to my veins.  But there are major benefits: it gives me something to do with my mornings (both my kids are in school and I'm not doing as much personal training these days, so what else am I supposed to do with all this time).  It helps me feel emotionally well.  For example yesterday I had something on my mind bothering me and when I got home from the gym it's like the issue had shrunk in terms of my perception of it's negative impact.  Also I still feel pretty physically fit.  My cardio fitness is still in a pretty good place, as I can easily maintain 1-2 of aerobic fitness.  Also my muscles are still fairly strong.  At my midwife appt she commented, "you have quite the strong abs my dear" and my legs and arms also still have some decent muscle.  Never mind that you can't really see it because there's some extra fat storage but it's nice to know it's there. I did a pump class yesterday and it felt very comfortable.

Countdown is on with just over three months until my due date.