This pretty much sums up life in the first few weeks of motherhood! |
Motherhood is rough.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s been the best 4 months of my life (13 if you
include pregnancy…because that was awesome as well!) I think I’ve said it over and over that I was
made to be a mom, it feels natural to me.
But damn, it is hard! It has been
harder on me than I ever expected and I’m not just talking about the sleepless
nights. It’s the amount of selflessness
involved. I consider myself a selfish
person, I like doing what I want, when I want so to flip a switch overnight and
start giving 100% of myself to this little person has been emotionally and
mentally draining. I’ve been working
full-time on developing this new part, this “mom-role” and I miss the other
parts of me. Before returning to work at
3.5 months I had no more than 20 hours separate from my little dude. I had been a mom for 2,520 hours and only had
20 hours of “me-time”. I miss being more
than just a mom and I’m ready to start living a balanced, full-life. I need to fill up my cup, so that there’s
something to pour from!
I’m lucky enough that I’m typically driven by intrinsic
motivation. I get up and go for my run
because it makes me feel good and that’s enough to motivate me to get out of
bed at 5 AM. I’ve also spent the past
couple of years working with a running coach, Magdalena Donahue from Bun on the Run who has helped me immensely and on
those days that my intrinsic motivation maybe wasn’t quite enough knowing that
someone else would know I skipped a workout was that extra kick in the butt I
needed to get out the door. She’s also pushed
me and made me a better runner, I’ve run farther and faster than I believed I
could because I had to report my workouts at the end of the week and if I
slacked she’d know. Realizing how much
of an impact this accountability has had on me making forward progress in my
running led me to wonder if some sort of accountability could help me get back into a postpartum groove
After CRUSHING my goals in the Chicago Rock n' Roll 10K at 20 weeks pregnant |
As a new mom I’ve spent the past few months aimlessly
wandering through my days in a sleep-deprived haze, eating whatever was
convenient (i.e. frozen meals and snacks) and fitting in maybe ten minutes of
workout a day because that’s all I could find time/energy for has been unpleasant to say the least. It’s just
not who I was before baby and it’s really not who I want to be as a mom. I want to be healthy and model a healthy
lifestyle for my children. I want them
to see what hard-work, dedication, and sacrifice can bring. And I’ve been struggling to be that
example, even though he's young it's never too early to start showing him what mom can do! I decided that I needed
accountability for more than just my running.
And I found it through someone who was an old friend and teammate of
mine and is now crushing it as a Beachbody coach.
Both of us LOVE our daily Shakeology! AKA Chocolate Salad! |
Since joining Beachbody I’ve noticed improvements in three
areas of life: diet, fitness, and mindset.
My diet has a LONG ways to go before it’s perfect. I'd call my diet habits 'good not great'. But just being asked every day to assess my
nutrition has motivated me to make smarter choices. Skipping breakfast has been replaced with a
nutrient, dense Shakeology and homemade Superhero Muffin. Frozen meals for lunch have been replaced
with Grilled Chicken and Quinoa Salads (prepped on Sunday for the week ahead),
and afternoon snacks of Mozzarella Sticks have been replaced with apples and
nut mix. After about a month of making
1-2 small changes a week I’m noticing an increase in my energy, the ability to
handle my emotions better, and I’m down to within 1-2 pounds of my
pre-pregnancy weight with a goal of losing another 5-10.
Sorry Friends! This guy is my favorite workout partner! |
My fitness jourey is a bit of a different story. I didn’t really enjoy the benefits immediately. I’d started to get back
into running and had some pelvic floor rehab and postpartum friendly workouts
that I’d been doing religiously. I
really didn’t need the accountability on this front, UNTIL I threw my back out. This was hard on me for so many reasons. I could barely lift Brooks, I couldn’t get on
the floor to play with him, Rob had to leave work early so I could make
doctors’ appointments. On top of taking
a forced break from running, I also felt like I was failing my family. This would’ve been a perfect opportunity for
me to start wallowing in self-pity and become a little
bit depressed about this set back.
Normally I’d go swim with friends but with a newborn and a husband who
goes to work at 6:30 AM there really wasn’t time to make that happen so even my
injury-outlet had disappeared.
BUT…because I was part of this accountability group I felt like I owed
it to my coach and the other challengers to show up every day. So I kept walking, I religiously foam-rolled,
I did my 3 sets of quarter crunches and bird-dogs. I recorded those as my workouts and checked
the “I did my workout” box every day.
And you know what? I saw huge
improvements. In less than a week I was
able to function like I needed to. And
in two weeks I was ready to add in more strenuous exercise so I looked over the
Beachbody On Demand program that I’d purchased and discovered PiYo. I’ve been doing PiYo for about a week and a
half now and my mobility has improved ten-fold, I have zero pain in my back. I
can also tell I’m working on all those muscles that are so important to supporting
me while I run and I feel ready to get back on the roads and start racking up
the miles. I felt stupid reporting that
my workout was ten minutes of foam rolling and a mile walk, but that
accountability kept me on track to do my rehab and heal myself quicker than I
probably would have without having to be accountable. I can tell that I’m on track to make my
postpartum body my best body!
Third is my outlook on life, my mindset. I didn’t know this when I’d signed up but a
huge part of Beachbody is personal development.
In my challenge group we were reading “50 Ways to Yay” which has
exercises to do at the end of each chapter.
These exercises reminded me of everything good I had in life and helped
me to stay focused on making small changes to become the best version of myself. At a time in life when I’m mentally drained,
being injured, not doing what I want, going back to work focusing on
personal development really helped me to keep my head above water and move
forward. You can have self-pity and
wallow for a minute, but it gets you nowhere in the long run and it turns out I
really needed this in life.
And finally, I would be omitting facts if I didn’t mention
the financial benefits. I’ve seen
several of my friends on Facebook gain the ability to design the life they want
because of this opportunity. Whether
that life is travel, better educational opportunities for kids, the ability to
work less or stay at home or pay down debt.
I’m excited to be entering a company that can provide me with the
financial freedom to design the life I want to live, the life I LOVE to
live! I don’t know exactly how I’ll
design my life…but I know that in time it’s going to be amazing!
It’s for these reasons: the accountability, the improved
diet, the delicious SHAKEOLOGY!, the positivity and support, the potential
financial earnings that I’ve decided to become a Beachbody coach. I’ve always wanted to use my passion for
fitness to help others but there were no opportunities that fit into my life or
made sense to me. After experiencing
Beachbody as a challenger and feeling the positive impact it had on my life over such a short period of time I know that this is the right place for me and that
this is the right time to share my journey.
I hope that this speaks to some people out there and lets them know that
they’re not alone in whatever daily struggles they face. We all have mountains to climb, but it’s so
much easier to make it to the top when you’re goals are supported by
friends! I hope to be that friend, that
women, that mom who can help lift others up to live the life they want! If you have questions about any of this or
just want to reach out and share your own story please don’t hesitate to
contact me, I’d love to talk and get to know you.
What has motivated you to move forward in the difficult
times?