Tuesday, June 2, 2015

My New Little Buddy Is Here!


My second child with the husband was born on 5-15-15.  He came in at 7lbs, 7oz and 20.5 inches long!  I had to be induced, which sucked the big one.   It only took 5 hours though and our sweet lil guy was in my arms.

As of now he's not sleeping through the night, which is to be expected.  Unfortunately our first son was a bit better about the sleep so I'm seriously deprived.  This is causing me to be a bit lazy on the workout front.  Instead of 1 to 1.5 hr long sessions I'm only able to get at most 45 minutes in, but that's better than nothing.

I'm now 2 weeks post-partum.  I lost 23 out of the 30 pounds of baby weight already, yay!  That's a far cry from the 60 pound weight gain from my first pregnancy.  My body is healing fast and my shape is coming back.  This, my friends, is why one must work out and eat well consistently while pregnant!

I only skipped 2 weeks out of the whole pregnancy.  Week 25 due to my WPW syndrome diagnosis and week 38 due to exhaustion.  I started back up at 10 days post-partum.  I already had my check-up with the OB and things are perfect.  On June 12th I go into the cardiologist for my heart ablation, which will fix my WPW.  It's out patient and I'm forbidden to lift anything over 10 pounds for 3 days, then I'm good to go!

I'm excited to get my energy back and to document the rest of my weight loss journey!


Wednesday, May 6, 2015

The Fit Preggo

I never struggled with my weight as a child or young adult.  I engaged in soccer all year, dance and band.  In general I was pretty active growing up.  It wasn't until after I had my first son that I had difficulty with losing and keeping off the baby weight.

My stress levels sky rocketed, mostly due to my blended family life. I'm a stepmother to 2 girls and my husband's EX isn't very nice.  It took me nearly 5 years after we got married for me to get my groove back, focus on the things I can control and get healthy again.  We've been together 8 years and married for 6.  My hubby and I seem to work in tandem.  If I'm motivated so is he.  If I get lazy, so does he.  I feel this enormous responsibility to stay on track.  Not only for my husband, but the kids as well.

When I got to the point where I felt I was in firm control of my mind, body and spirit.  I was in great shape and we decided to go ahead and expand our family.  I kept a very consistent work-out schedule and did the best I could to continue to eat healthy.  I'm not what they call a "clean" eater.  I do my best to eat healthy foods and balance my diet with some cheat meals.  I usually go about 1-2 of those on the weekends.  No full cheat days or fast food like McDonald's though.  Subway is my best friend when I need something quick and easy.  The kids love that place, thank goodness!

I am pregnant with baby boy #2 and was diagnosed with a congenital heart condition at 24 weeks gestation.  My cardiologist suggested that I completely stop exercising until I can have the ablation done after I give birth.  I had a massive emotional meltdown when I was told that weight lifting was a serious no-no.  I took the following week off of working out, but I went mad crazy.  I decided to form my own, private compromise with the diagnosis.  Since I've been apparently living with this condition since birth and haven't dropped dead yet, what's the harm in working out, but on a much smaller scale?  So that's exactly what I've done.

I continued 4-5 days of cardio and strength training as usual, then dropped to 3 days around 32 weeks gestation.  Now I'm on 2-3 days of strength training and much less cardio because I cramp up.  I dropped the amount of weight I'm lifting and increased my reps.  I'm doing a simple, modified version of my old routine.  I listen to my body.  If it says STOP, I do.  Not every day is the same though in terms of my energy levels.

Now at 38 weeks gestation, I've gained 29 pounds and am probably about done now.  The first time around I gained 60 pounds and didn't eat right AT ALL.  Exercise?  No way!  I was 29 yrs old then and now I'm 36.  Times have changed.  I have changed and I'm so glad I stuck with it.  Being pregnant has its own set of challenges, but sticking with an exercise routine while pregnant is so much harder.  With less than 2 weeks left until I welcome my new son into this world I still have the desire and energy to keep going.  I'm hoping to bounce back quicker and will post my progress.