Hello blog

Written yesterday…                                                              

 I have been debating whether or not to pick back up my blog.  It’s been so long since I had the time or energy to write.  I was too exhausted in the last 2 months of pregnancy to write and then having a new born hasn’t left me with much time or interest in blogging.  Bennett suggested that I might find it helpful to write about Ian’s birth, and I spent the morning doing that.  It reminded me that I usually enjoy my blogging so I’ve decided to see how it goes.  I’m still deciding if I want to post my write up from this morning or maybe an edited shortened version, but for now, post-partum running…

I had a checkup 2 weeks after Ian was born and of course one of the first things I asked was how soon can I run.  I had a post baby plan all thought through and honestly it didn’t involve getting a doctor’s permission to run or not run.  I know my body well enough to judge myself under normal circumstances.  But that was when the birth was going to go as planned, with little to no interventions.  Since we ended up with a C-section, I thought it would be smarter to actually check with the doctor.  I was healing well so he told me at 4 weeks to go for a power walk, and if it felt ok, I could start running.  But if I had any pain in the incision…well I shouldn’t so listen to my body and that would mean I was doing too much.  I cheated a bit and started lifting at week 3 since I felt good.  I had managed to continue lifting until the week before Ian was born.  With only a few weeks off it wasn’t too hard to ease back into it.

At exactly 4 weeks post-partum I was on the treadmill.  Not only did I not have anyone to run with outside, but running on the treadmill meant if it hurt, I could just stop.  I was afraid I wouldn’t even make it through the 5k run I had planned since I hadn’t run at all since late January.  Happily, I got through 5k without hurting or needing to stop!  It was pretty slow though and the next day I was sore…kind of humbling…

A successful first run made me immediately jump to the question of how fast I can build back up my distance and weekly mileage without hurting myself.   I’m still playing around with that question 3 weeks later.

4 weeks Post-partum running week 1: 2 5k runs and a 4 mile run

5 weeks postpartum running week 2: 2 3 mile runs and a 5 mile run

6 weeks post-partum running week 3: a 3 mile run, a 4 mile run, a 5 mile run, and a 6 mile run

I’ve been pretty happy with my progress, although all treadmill running gets a little boring.  Several of my runs had to be interrupted for emergency baby tending, definitely showing me that running seriously with a baby is going to be a whole different experience.