When I was only in my first trimester, I told my husband that we absolutely had to purchase a treadmill. At 30 years old, I had spent many years hearing about ‘losing the baby weight’, and I knew that having a treadmill in our home would make ‘losing the baby weight’ much more convenient. So off we went to Sears to make what was an excellent, and quite frankly, rather expensive purchase.
I probably used the treadmill about 10 times during my entire pregnancy. I was much more concerned with my swollen feet and increasing appetite. Let’s just say that I hoped there were plenty of nutrients for my baby in Tex-Mex food, because I sure did consume my fair share during those months.
The real effort to get fit after baby didn’t really start for me until my son was about 8 months old. In my opinion, that happens to be around the time when I felt my hormone levels were getting back to normal. I think that feeling like myself again helped inspire me to get healthy. So that beautiful, expensive treadmill sat in our new home for quite a while waiting for me to take it for a spin. I began by walking mostly and only running a little. I also downloaded the MyFitnessPal app on my phone to track my daily food intake, calories and exercise. I had many, many struggles at the beginning. I would get angry because I wanted to eat more. I would feel tired and lazy, not wanting to exercise. But thank goodness I stuck with it and overcame many of those negative thoughts and feelings. Don’t get me wrong, I still get frustrated. I still eat some bad food. But I have made so many improvements and continue to do so as time goes by. I lost 30 pounds in about 10 months, then the holidays arrived. I definitely loosened up over the holidays and put on a few pounds. So I’ve spent all of January trying to get those few pounds back off. I learned my lesson there. It’s one thing to have a little fun over the holidays, but next time I’ll go with about 1 pound of fun. Not 3. When it takes you an entire week to lose 1 pound, you have an entirely new perspective on gaining.
For me, having a treadmill in my home was the absolute best way to get in shape. I run and watch my favorite TV shows on DVR while my son is napping. No leaving the house or worrying about weather conditions. It’s perfect for me. And when he gets older and is in school, I’m sure that will allow me to broaden my fitness horizons a bit. I’d love to run outside when the weather is nice and get back into dance classes.
What about you? How do you stay fit as a parent?
Kind Kiddo 