Mummy Tummy

I had a lot of fear around getting pregnant. Not the normal stuff though. I didn't have as big of fear of if I would stay pregnant, would I get tonnes of morning sickness - as someone who hates throwing up  this was a concern. I did have some qualms about if I could get pregnant since I had almost zero cycle for close to 2 yrs.. that's part of another post..

One of my biggest fears was what pregnancy would do to my body. Social media, the way people talk about child birth etc all sends the message that pregnancy and child birth will ruin your body
Now, being someone who has had body issues for quite some time this is a terrifying thought

What if - I don't "bounce back" like my social media feed shows
What if - I can't lose the baby weight
What if - I am covered in stretch marks
What if - My husband doesn't find me physically attractive anymore
What if -I stop working out and just get huge

I had a lot of people say to me that I would bounce back quickly because of how active I was previously and during my pregnancy. Like most people I worked out because of wanting to change how things looked on the outside. I also wrote a post regarding working out previously, that I would workout even if I was blind and that still rings true

Things changed a bit when I was pregnant. Previously I would work 6 days a week and workout 5-7 days a week. I was always in overdrive and always wanted to do more. More is better - right?
Actually, many studies prove the opposite. But, I need to learn the hard way - as per usual

So... I did still workout frequently. That's detailed in another post. I never stopped working out. It's a mental release for sure, working out feels good! I like feeling capable and strong, and if I didn't do at least something with that energy I would get restless legs and just be annoying to those around me ha

I have been lucky enough to be able to breast feed our baby. I've also been lucky enough on top of that to have enough milk to sustain and have our child thrive. I don't take that lightly. We have a very even tempered baby who responds well to changes in the day (he must get that from his dad) and goes with the flow with minimal complaints. He is a dream

I'm going to share some photos I took throughout my pregnancy. From when I first learned I was pregnant to my 40 wks and final pregnant pic / selfie
After that is the pictures following my post partum life - with the sexy underwear and all
You may recall that I had a C-section and was under strict rules of NO working out. The best I could do in the first four weeks was go for a walk around the block! It took a while to get back to it and it was slow.  I recently competed in a triathlon! It's been such a trial to get back into fighting shape it was over whelming and hard to get back into a 'normal routine'

newly pregnant

somewhere in the middle - took approx 28 wks to look actually pregnant VS chubby

Last pregnant selfie and 1wk PP

1M PP and 2M PP I had to start wearing two bras to go for runs/softball (breastfeeding problems)

the pic on the left is not altered although I thought it looked that way. I'm going to go ahead and say breastfeeding has caused me to be smaller than before I got pregnant

I have actually started eating carbs again - what! I was not following a keto diet beforehand more so just starving myself I guess. I started to actually respect rest days while pregnant and have taken it much slower to head to the gym etc if I had a night of poor sleep etc the day before. Trying to be kind to myself and my strength is coming back slowly!

In the end, I did not have any stretch marks. I have minimal wrinkling of my skin and my stomach although still soft six months later has slowly tightened up and shrunk - as you can see from the pics 

When I flex now you can almost see my stomach actually tighten instead of just looking like I'm sucking it in and seeing where my rib cage starts. I think my organs have moved back to where theyre supposed to be but I've also noticed that my butt has shrunk! I worked hard to stop that but it's likely do to the amount of calories I use in a day breast feeding and working out. I haven't food prepped in a long time and find that I don't have the drive to prep these days. Haven't felt that drive for quite some time. Possibly because I did food prep every three days for 3 yrs? Who knows for sure

Here we are! 6 months post partum (today) I have a wonderful little boy a loving family, something that resembles a routine in the day and a cool scar. We all know that chicks dig scars am I right? haha