THE BARBELL BLOG
A solid resource squeezing out the facts
Let your body be postpartum.
Creating a baby changes your body forever. You don't need to "get your body back", cause your body never left.
Let's start changing the conversation around women's bodies, during pregnancy and afterwards.
"You hardly look like you've had a baby!"
"Damn, girl, you look amazing. How did you lose the baby weight?"
It's like we're in a race to lose the "baby weight" after the baby is born. .
Why is that we aim to look like we didn't have a baby, as soon as possible?
We start counting the calories. We start doing the home workouts. We join stroller bootcamps.
What if... instead... we just let our bodies be postpartum? What if we trusted that our bodies needed some time to heal? What if we waited to get back into that crazy fitness regime? What if we focused on conserving our energy to care for our new baby, and for ourselves? What if we said yes to the help, and rested?
Creating a baby changes your body forever. You don't need to "get your body back", cause your body never left. 😉
Let's start changing the conversation around women's bodies, during pregnancy and afterwards.
Two kids under two.
I was tired. The toddler didn’t sleep well. My husband travelled a lot with work. No family in town. Potty training.
Trying to navigate life as a family of four was hard.
But yet I started exercising as soon as I could. I went to a bootcamp when Madelyn was 6 weeks old. We ran. We did burpees. We did crunches.
I was praised for getting out when she was so little. It was like a badge of honour.
I get it. I was there. I wanted that sweat. I wanted to lose the “baby weight”. So I exercised. A lot. And I paid for it for the next 7 years.
I wish someone told me to wait. I wish someone told me that the fitness classes will be there...later. I wish someone would have told me that I would have the rest of my life to get that sweat on.
I wish someone would have told me to Rest. Recover Rehab. Retrain.
Our bodies can take a beating as we create a baby. And our bodies need to heal.
There are some things that moms can do to help that process. To help heal the postpartum body.
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Ive created a guide on the top four things every mom needs to do to help heal their postpartum body. Click on my link to get your free copy.
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I ish someone would have told me what to do.
There are things you can do to help heal your body BEFORE you start back into your regular exercise. Grab my free guide here.
Why We Just Need to Let Them Cry.
When they're babies, we spend our days trying to figure out why they're crying. Are they hungry, wet, tired? But as they get older and learn to communicate their feelings, we need to start listening to them. And we need to let them cry.
She came home after school looking so sad.
I asked her what was wrong and she burst into tears. Her school art project got squished on the bus. Her brother accidentally sat on it. She wasn't mad at him. She was just really upset it was broken.
I had stuff to do. I was in the middle of making dinner. The puppy was getting into trouble.
My first instinct was to say "No big deal. We can build it again."
But I didn't.
I sat down, gave her a hug and let her cry.
She's a happy kid. Loves to give, to laugh and to smile. But when she is sad, she cries.
So often, we try to hold those emotions in, because we think crying will be seen as a sign of weakness. And so we (maybe unknowingly) teach our kids to:
"Stay strong'.
"Hold your head up."
"Suck it up cupcake."
But when in reality, they just need to cry.
When they're babies, we spend our days trying to figure out why they're crying. Are they hungry, wet, tired? But as they get older and learn to communicate their feelings, we need to start listening to them.
You've been there before - feeling blah so you turn on a tear jerker movie and open up the flood gates. Feels good doesn't it? To have a good cry?
There are benefits to crying too....It can reduce stress and improve mood.
And perhaps, if we tap into that feeling of sadness, we just might become more aware of feelings of happiness and gratitude.
Sometimes, we just gotta let them cry.