My fitness progress
Posted by leah on May 18, 2008
Just a personal check-in. I got weighed because I had to go to the doctor (don’t own a scale, since I don’t like to obsess over a few pounds) and found out I have about 10 pounds to lose if I want to be at my pre-pregnancy weight. Not bad for 10 weeks postpartum, but I had 11 pounds to lose at 6 weeks postpartum, which means my weight loss from nursing has completely stopped.
That’s okay - I’ve recovered enough from the delivery now that I’m gradually starting to exercise more, little by little, so I am probably getting healthier even though not thinner at the moment. But it did make me realize that I should probably not use the 500 calories a day that nursing burns as an excuse to eat as much chocolate as I want…
So I’m making more of an effort to prepare meals at home and include a lot of veggies. I don’t like to deprive myself if I’m craving something, because I’ll eventually cave in and overdo it, so instead I try to eat something healthy first, so that I’m not starving when I indulge. That way I’m more likely to just have one piece of chocolate.
Today I wanted chicken strips, the deep fried kind from the deli counter at the grocery store, so instead of making a whole meal out of that, I cut one into pieces and had it on top of a salad with lettuce, kidney beans, corn, celery, and radishes (the veggies that happened to be in my fridge). So instead of having four chicken strips dipped in 1/4 cup of ranch dressing, I had one chicken strip with two or three servings of veggies and two tablespoons of ranch. It’s not a perfect meal, but it’s a lot healthier than just having the fried chicken and ranch - and it completely satisfied the craving I was having. Plus I still have three chicken strips, so I can have the same salad for the next three days in a row if I want to. Adding lettuce is such a great way to make an unhealthy craving a lot less bad for you - it works for my cheese cravings and my salty carb cravings too - I just substitute some cheese or croutons for the fried chicken. Again, it isn’t perfect - I am still getting some unhealthy saturated fat and/or empty calories - but it’s a lot better than eating what I’m craving without adding veggies to it. If I could find a salad dressing that was healthy that I liked as much as ranch, I’d be all set….
For exercise, what I’m currently doing is sun salutations and some other yoga poses while my son naps sometime in the morning, usually for about 15 minutes, walks with him in the stroller, and dancing around our house holding him (one of his favorite games, especially if I sing along with the music). Then I try to sneak in a minute or two of abs, squats, or other toning exercises here and there throughout the day. It’s not perfect, and I do need to start doing longer workouts again soon, but it’s definite progress from a month ago when I was just starting to take walks, and was pretty tired from the exertion of pushing the stroller a mile or two. Walking is feeling normal and like an easy workout again, and I can definitely tell my arms are getting stronger from doing the sun salutations. My son is able to go longer between feedings than he used to, so hopefully I can start leaving him with my husband so I can do longer workouts, or do a workout DVD when my husband is home to play with him. One thing that is nice about getting back in shape at home, rather than by taking classes at the gym, is that I can completely tailor my workouts to what I need - specific ab exercises designed to help with the muscle separation from pregnancy, back stretches to correct the slumping shoulders I get after carrying the baby for a while, just enough leg work to be a little tired but know I won’t be too sore the next day to want to dance with my son.