Bedrest

Four days and no gym.

I love the gym.

Ok, well, I love the gym when people aren’t commenting on how much weight I’ve gained or how I shouldn’t be doing certain things in my “condition.”

For those of us who have spent years or even decades watching the number on the scale or fixating on our pant size, pregnancy can make you feel lost and out of control. Yes, yes, we all know that you have to get bigger and that the end product makes the torture of getting dressed a little easier, but it’s still hard to look in the mirror everyday and know that what you’ve spent the past year working towards is slowly unraveling.

I’m a runner. It took me a long time to be able to say that. Sure, I’ve been running since high school, but it was only last year that I decided I was going to be a “runner.” I ran my first half-marathon one week before I got married and two weeks before we conceived. I tried to keep running through the first trimester, but between fatigue and nausea, it didn’t work out so well. I didn’t make it back to the gym until August and by then, I had lost a lot of stamina. Running was no longer fun and even bordered on painful. I have bad knees anyways, and you can’t take most supplements while pregnant. Plus, pregnancy relaxes your joints — all of them, even your toes. Yeah, it helps when the baby is trying to push his big head out of your tiny pelvis, but it really sucks if you try to run more than a few feet.

It’s also really hard to run when you have to pee every three minutes.

So, my running has gone the way of my size 4 jeans.

I still run on occasion, but it’s usually only a few minutes along with a lot of walking. I’ve also slowed way down. I had imagined myself being one of those amazing pregnant women who ran up until the day they went into labor. You know, the ones who only gain weight in their stomach and maintain perfectly sculpted muscles everywhere else while wearing the most adorable maternity running clothes. (Ok, so I’m not sure where these muscles were going to come from on me, but shut up… it’s my fantasy.)

Yeah, that didn’t happen. I’m pretty sure that when I do run, it’s pretty unflattering. I have a Kim Kardashian butt when I’m not gestating, and I think it’s gotten even bigger. I’m not sure since I can’t bend back far enough to look. Plus, I had a hard time keeping the girls in check before and now with an extra cup size or two, not even the best sports bra can hold them down. Thank God there aren’t mirrors in the cardio room.

Did I mention that I was supposed to be running the Marine Corps Marathon Saturday?

At this point, you might be asking, “Well, if you can’t run, why do you love the gym so much?” And I would respond, “Well, if you are only doing cardio at the gym, you are missing out.”

I <3 weight lifting.

I started weight lifting after I had my first daughter, and I love it. Nothing changes your body like lifting heavy weights repeatedly. I am sure that if I was consistent in my workouts (ie, stopped taking six month long workout breaks every seven months), I would be in fitness model land. That is, if fitness models had stretch marks and cellulite. Weight lifting is also the perfect exercise for pregnant women. You even get to sit down most of the time! I’ve been lifting again for 2 months now (after a three month break, aka the trimester of doom) and I really look forward to it. Sometimes I feel awkward because I go to a military gym and about 99% of the other lifters are men. Very big, muscley, strong men. With lots of tattoos. But now, they accept me with a nod and we all go back to our own business. Plus, I keep a workout log (if you don’t have one, you should start one… trust me) and it’s great to look back to August and see that I’m pressing double the weight that I was then and that I’m benching twenty more pounds. In a time of chaos and hormones, it’s nice to know that my body isn’t losing everything I have been working towards, at least yet.

It’s hard for women to build muscle. We just don’t have the testosterone levels that men do and testosterone is what builds muscle. Pregnant women have even smaller amounts of testosterone than their non-gestating counterparts. So, it’s really, really hard for pregnant women to build muscle. Hell, it’s hard for us just to maintain our muscle mass so the gains in strength that I’m seeing make me pretty happy. I’m anticipating losing some muscle when I have the baby and can’t go to the gym for 6 weeks and during the third trimester when I have no energy to go to the gym.

I think that’s what is bothering me about being put on bedrest.

I’m on “modified” bedrest which means I can get up to go pee (which I do a lot), I can make myself something to eat, and I can drive Kaelin to school. I’m not supposed to be doing housework, taking the dog for a walk, or going grocery shopping. I’m now sedentary — doing only what I need to for basic survival. In addition to not burning my normal three to four hundred calories at the gym, I’m not burning the 100 calories by vacuuming the house or the 50 calories by doing laundry. Those little activities add up. I’m very interested to see how my weigh-in goes this week, since I’ve been on an emotional roller coaster since this weekend and living off of chocolate, pasta, and fast food.

Plus, daytime TV really sucks and the weather is perfect outside to take the dog for a walk.

24 Weeks

I think there is something about pregnancy that saps the creative energy from you. That, or maybe it’s just all the energy going into baby names and nursery themes. Either way, my blogging ability has significantly declined in the past few months. I have topic after topic I want to talk about, but when I sit down at the computer, every thought goes out of my head.

I’m 24 weeks now. Yay for viability! That means if something bad happens and I go into labor, there is about a 50% chance that the baby will make it. Granted, those aren’t great odds, but over the next few weeks, the survival chance will jump up to 90% and after 34 weeks, the chances are the same as a full-term baby. Of course, I don’t plan on going into labor early, but it’s nice to know. Twenty-four weeks is also supposed to be the best time during pregnancy. You are showing, but you aren’t so big that you can’t see your feet. You still have energy, the baby is active, and you aren’t swollen yet.

Supposed to be, anyways. I’m peeing every 20 minutes, I’m very achy, and I can’t sleep. I feel like I’ve been hit in the crotch with a bowling ball. Repeatedly. I don’t understand it, but I can workout for an hour at the gym with no problems, but I can’t walk around the grocery store without getting winded. I’m also getting overwhelmed with the basic parenting stuff. Since my baby shower isn’t until next month, we have very little set up for the baby. In fact, the nursery is still full of our office furniture.

It’s funny that this is baby #2 because I don’t remember having these feelings when I was pregnant with Kaelin.  Anyways, I had my 24 week weigh-in and I haven’t quite hit that 20 lb mark yet. I’m at 19 lbs, but if I keep gaining at about a pound a week, I’ll be around 35 lbs when I deliver. It’s a little high for what I wanted at the start of my pregnancy, but still within reason.

I'm Not 20 Anymore

Last night, we went into downtown Charleston for dinner. Charleston is full of two types of people, tourists and college students. The University of Charleston is spread throughout the city and it seemed like the student body was out in full force last night.

Between getting my bachelors and then grad school, I have spent most of my adult life in college. But I’m not a “college kid” anymore. Now that I’m approaching my thirties, I realize that I will never be the thin, tan girl walking around town in booty shorts with sorority letters on the butt. Not that I think it’s a good look on someone who hasn’t had kids and is still cellulite free let alone someone in their forth decade of life, but I wish I still had that option.

I NEVER dressed like that. In high school, I never thought once about my weight or my size. I was really comfortable with myself, but my school had a pretty strict dress code excluding short shorts and tank tops. Although I lived on the water, I rarely swam and don’t remember owning a bathing suit, let alone a bikini. I’ve always been a jeans and flannel (shut up, grunge was in then) kind of girl.

When I started college, I was a mom who had gained 87 lbs. I was 21, but I definitely had no desire to walk around campus showcasing the goods. I lost most of the weight and was at a much healthier 125, but I still felt fat. Well, not fat. More like not fit. I was thin again, but this time I had stretch marks and cellulite. I was a size 4, but I kept telling myself that after I lost a few inches I would feel better. THEN, I would wear those shorts. I even bought a pair of skimpy red shorts that said KANSAS in blue letters, of course with the intent of drawing everyone’s eyes to my butt. I never took the tag off. No matter how small I was, I was never comfortable enough to wear them, even around the house.

And I regret that.

There is a very limited time in life that someone can get away with showing that much skin, and your 30s aren’t it. I feel terrible saying this, but every time I go into Wal-Mart, I see older women dressing like preteens and it makes me want to run off and call Stacy and Clinton. I’m not quite ready to embrace my age, but I will NEVER go out in public dressed the same as my daughter. I mean, Pamela Anderson still has a great body, but really, who wants to see every inch of it now? So even once I have this baby and get back down to my goal weight, I won’t be wearing those shorts I have been saving for almost 10 years. At least, not in public. (Skinny jeans are the new booty shorts anyways.)

But if I could, I would go back in time and shake my 21 year old self and make her wear those shorts… at least once.