On Losing 55 Pounds // Postpartum Weight Loss

I've been thinking about writing this post for almost a year now. The journey of postpartum weight loss is different for everyone, but for me it was a huge struggle. I'm passionate about good food but self-control is not one of my strengths, so losing the weight I gained during my first pregnancy was not a walk in the park. As I'm now faced with trying to lose all of the weight from my second pregnancy, I thought I would share my story and a few thoughts for those of you that may be walking this same road of losing weight after baby.

When I was pregnant with Madeleine I gained a little over 50 pounds. I had a really challenging first trimester which prevented me from keeping up with any sort of exercise routine, but I also know I ate way more carbs and sweets than I should have. People (and my doctor) made comments about my weight gain, but I honestly felt helpless to do anything about it because my cravings for both the quantity of food I wanted to consume and the types of food I wanted to consume seemed so out of my control. I had a long and difficult birth with Madeleine, so it was a while before I was up for even the littlest amount of physical activity. At my 6-week check up my doctor told me I needed to wait an additional few weeks to heal before I could start exercising. When I finally healed, I started running but only kept that up for so long. I honestly didn't do anything too structured to try to lose the weight: we tried Whole30 (and failed miserably!) and I tried counting calories, but neither of those was sustainable for me. Like I said, I seriously struggle with self-control, and I just didn't want to change how I was eating and sacrifice my normal diet.

It took me four months to get within 15 pounds of my pre-pregnancy weight, but it took another six months for me to finally lose those last 15 pounds and hit my goal. I lost an additional 2 pounds to lose a total of 55 pounds in 11 months. And then I found out I was pregnant two weeks later. My second pregnancy was more challenging than my first, and even though I was throwing up a lot in the first trimester, I was constantly starving and eating everything in sight. Again, I made poor eating choices because I felt so miserable, and I couldn't keep up with any exercise. In my second pregnancy I gained 55 pounds.

My recovery after Cora's birth (her birth story to come at some point, I promise!) has been so much easier than with Madeleine. I've been out walking already, and it feels so great to be moving and exercising! I've lost 20 pounds so far, but I have a long way to go. It's really daunting to be back in this same spot looking down a long road of trying to lose so much weight and working to fit into my normal clothes. It's easy to feel discouraged when I compare myself to other young moms who seem to lose the weight easily. It's easy to make healthy choices one day, only to have a rough night with little sleep and give into the temptation to eat three cookies the next day. It's easy to feel depressed when I feel like I have nothing wear. It's easy to feel like I'm never going to get my old body back, so what's the point. It's easy to feel bitter about the toll childbearing takes on my body, instead of joyfully giving of my body for my children. I think it's probably safe to say that I'm not alone in having these feelings. Pregnancy, childbirth, life with a newborn, life adjusting to multiple kids - these are all very real and very hard things, and losing a lot of weight after and in the midst of them is challenging!

I once read that self-control is just empathy with your future self, and that's really ringing true for me right now. It seems like I just lost 55 pounds, so I remember so clearly how both the struggle and the success felt. It's a little easier for me to make healthier choices this time around. I'm motivated to make exercising more of a priority. I have no idea if losing 55 pounds this time will take less than or longer than 11 months, but I'm trying to be patient with myself and the process. I've been thinking a lot about this passage, which I read in Loving the Little Years: Motherhood in the Trenches this week:

"...realize that your body is a testimony to the world of God's design.

Carry the extra weight joyfully until you can lose it joyfully. Carry the 

scars joyfully as you carry the fruit of them. Do not resent the damages that 

your children left on your body...your body can more fully praise God having 

been used for His purposes. So don't resent it, enjoy it."

On Running with a Baby

I've concluded that running with a baby has to be one of the most taxing of exercises. Let's think about this for a moment. You're pushing a baby in a stroller. For me, that means a 15-pound baby, a 25-pound stroller, and a 10-pound carseat. I'll do the math for you: that's 50 pounds I'm pushing up and down hills. On top of all of the weight you're pushing, you're carrying all of the weight that's still clinging to you from being pregnant with that now 15-pound baby. (I'll spare you the details on exactly how much that still is for me.) And, if you're breastfeeding, you're also carrying along your baby's next meal.

So we've got a 50-pound load you're pushing, extra weight you're carrying from pregnancy, plus essentially a picnic for the baby strapped to your chest. And, if you're like me who barely exercised during pregnancy, you are pretty out of shape.

All of that is physically demanding and quite a workout. Now let's add in the mental workout of this situation. As you're running through your neighborhood, smiling and waving at neighbors and for the love just trying to push that dang stroller up that hill, you are also constantly aware of what your baby is doing and anticipating what your baby might need. Ok she just spit up, grab the burp cloth and wipe that nastiness off her little chin. Oh no, she's starting to fuss. Quick! put the toy snail in her hand. Ok that's not working, squeeze the snail's head a few times so it squeaks. Ok whew, she smiled. We're good.

And then, right when you've finished a couple of miles and you're starting to get a cramp in your side, the baby finally falls asleep. And so you just keep running. Because, sleeping baby. That elusive evening catnap finally won over the fussy baby and you can't stop running now. You run a couple more miles so that the baby will sleep and wake up ready to play happily during dinnertime.

And then when you put the baby down for bed that night and finally have a chance to log your exercise into your weight-loss app, you do a happy dance when you realize you have just enough calories left to treat yourself to a tiny bowl of Häagen-Dazs mint chip ice cream. And in that moment, you decide those extra miles were totally worth it.

2013 Goal: Run a 10K

One of my goals for this year was to run a 10K. I'm not a runner, but the few times I've run consistently has been training for a race, so I knew this would be the main way to get my butt out the door running. I started training after New Year's (so cliché!), but I never worked up to the full 10K before race day. I had gotten up to 4 miles, but because I'm not disciplined and because I hurt my foot, I hadn't gone any further. Saturday was the race and I was pretty nervous, not knowing how my foot would feel after having not run for three weeks, and also never having run more than four miles in my life! It started snowing/raining as we were heading to the race, which was awesome (not). It only rained for the first little bit of the race, but it was still pretty cold! I was feeling pretty good up until the last mile, which was entirely uphill. I really wanted to run the whole thing and not stop and walk any of it, so I kept pushing myself. Caleb was cheering me on up the last hill (he had finished like 40 minutes earlier!), and I finally finished. I ran that race very slowly, but I actually ran the whole thing! I'm hoping this will help motivate me to keep running and being active, as that is the area in my life that I am the least disciplined. 

Have you accomplished any of your goals for this year?

The Time I Tried A Pinterest Diet

Y'all - I tried a diet I found on Pinterest.  Pinterest!  I'm embarrassed to even admit this, but this blog is not about sharing only my finer moments.  So this "military diet" that I found claims you can lose 10 pounds in three days by following a weird meal plan with no snacks in between.  Some of these meals even included ice cream and hot dogs (hello dream diet!).  I knew it sounded really whack but thought if it actually worked I could drop a few pounds and it would motivate me to eat healthier and drop a few more.  Here's how it went down:

Day 1 Breakfast: 1/2 a grapefruit, toast with 2 Tbsp of peanut butter, green tea

 

The green tea clearly did not live up to my routine morning cup of pumpkin spice coffee, heavy on the cream.  I started off my Monday grumpy and groggy - I knew it was going to be a long day!  I was hungry about 9:45 wishing I could have a morning snack.  Instead I drank another 16 ounces of water and went to the bathroom two more times.

Day 1 Lunch:  2 oz chicken, 1/4 cup yogurt with 1/2 tsp flax seed, green tea

I was so hungry by the time I ate lunch that I scarfed it down and forgot to take a picture.  But imagine like 9 teeny tiny pieces of grilled chicken and about three spoonfuls of yogurt.  I was still starving when my lunch was gone.  From about 1:30 on, every time I got up from my desk I was lightheaded.  I started developing a migraine that worsened as the day went on.  I was feeling so faint I could barely concentrate on work.  By the time I got home I was way past the point of hungry and just felt sick.

Day 1 Dinner:  3 oz chicken, 1 cup green beans, 1/2 banana, small apple, 1 cup vanilla ice cream

I was so impatient to hurry up and eat that I undercooked the green beans.  They tasted like they were straight up from the dirt (do green beans even grow in the dirt? whatever).  The chicken was good, but once I finished it I really wanted something more than just fruit.  This was the most food I had been allowed to eat all day but it just wasn't satisfying.  Caleb kept telling me to just can the diet and how it wasn't healthy and wasn't worth it for me to be miserable.  So, I quit!  My name is Sherri Lynn and I am a diet quitter.  The last diet I was going to try was a cleanse (yikes, that I also found on Pinterest!), and I chickened out the day before I started.  

I think the moral of this story is to stay away from diets that you find on Pinterest.  Also, just eat healthily and exercise.

P.S.  I did lose 2.7 pounds that day!  But duh, if you starve yourself of course you'll lose weight.  Totally not worth it.

Do or Don't: Detox Cleanse

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I've been thinking about doing a health cleanse.  Have you ever done one?  I don't want to do the kind where you buy all that juice and survive on liquids alone - blech.  I need there to be a little more variety!  There are dozens of different "cleanse" ideas floating around the internet, so I don't know how to pick one!  Any suggestions?  Would you do a detox cleanse?