#43: One thing tired mums should stop doing to stay consistent with exercising
I am one of these “all or nothing” girls.
Once I decide to do something I dive right in. That refers to anything in my life. Work, training and even shopping. I’m not proud of it, but the truth is that I often struggle to find the balance.
That is one of the reasons why I overtrained a few years ago and seriously overstressed my adrenals. Since then, I have to be more careful as just one step too far and I end up dealing with adrenal fatigue again.
This is exactly what happened with my post pregnancy training.
Weight training is perfect for ovulatory phase as long as you adjust the lengths and intensity to your recovery.
I was so impatient, fed up with my mummy tummy and the lowest fitness level I had ever had.
I didn’t feel good in my body simply because what I imagined my postnatal recovery will look like. It was far beyond the reality.
As soon as I decided to start training again (it was already 6 months “post-party”) I went all in. I decided I will focus on weight training to get the fastest results (I love lifting weights as I struggle to push myself to do HIIT now – result of overtraining). I was so excited after I finished each 60 min workout (while Freya was napping). I didn’t sleep at night, I was breastfeeding, but that didn’t matter.
All I wanted to do was feel “normal” again.
Oh dear, I only lasted two weeks. At first I could feel that buzzing energy during my workout. My body was responding so well to it. It felt like exactly what I needed. Until I started getting weaker, and weaker, and then I could not finish my workout anymore… It wasn’t more than 6 sessions.
I overdid it.
I tried a couple more times and by Freya’s first birthday I was dealing with adrenal fatigue again.
It is the first time I could not finish my workout. I was smiling as I thought it was a temporary set back. It wasn’t. It was when my fatigue started coming back.
I had no energy to do anything.
Small things made my hands shake. Everything was extremely challenging and I had that stress knot in my stomach the whole time. Being on the edge was no fun. I managed to get it under control during my mum’s two weeks visit here. I was lucky she could already travel abroad and that she was keen on helping with all the household chores.
As we have our babies later and later in our life, we are more prone to overwhelm and fatigue. Most of us live a very fast life before we have kids leading to a deep sense of exhaustion and absence of reserve energy. You may have not even noticed that the challenges you face over the years exhaust you and your body gets very tired.
Pregnancy, birth and motherhood, as beautiful as they are, take up a lot of our energy.
To be able to find balance in our new life, we need to balance our energy. Exercising is a wonderful habit, that can help with that.
stretches will make you feel wonderful. I didn’t always have patience to do them. I actually never liked stretching. Today I feel like every cell of my body is happier after a gentle stretch session. Together with walking they are perfect for menstrual phase.
Exercising is an enjoyable and healthy behaviour as long as it isn’t taken to unenjoyable extremes.
As a new mum, who has so much going on, exercise may be the last thing on the long list of things to do. Yet it is necessary.
We often associate exercising with hardcore, sweaty workouts. However, in those first months after having a baby the last thing you should do are long, high intensity workouts. All you need is a few minutes a day, first to rehabilitate your post pregnancy abdominal muscles and afterwards to gently strengthen, mobilise and stretch your whole body. It sounds complex, but it is actually very simple and can be done in 5 min (or less in the first few weeks postpartum).
When you start associating exercises with gentle, feel-good movements, that increase your energy, you will be more likely to do it regularly.
All you need is to find 5 minutes a day just to move. If like me, you’re always wearing comfy clothes at home, you don’t have to change to exercise. Better. You won’t even need to put your shoes on (bare foot training is way better than the one performed with shoes on).
Every time you manage to find a few minutes to do your exercises is a success. This is all that matters now. We are so used to setting high goals and pushing ourselves beyond our limits but now is not the time. Your mental and physical health depend on that. A little movement goes a long way.
Even thought it is only 5 minutes, you still may be interrupted by your child or even a spouse but that’s ok. Showing your kids that exercise is important to you, will make them keener on moving more themselves. These days when technology makes our kids more sedentary and keeps them indoors, being a role model is really important.
When you plan your sessions, choose maximum 5 exercises. Depending on how far you are with your postnatal recovery and how hard these exercises are, perform them for 30-60 seconds.
After having a baby, you cannot start exercising with any type of crunches. You need a postnatal abdominal fix workout that will restore your muscle-mind connection and strengthen your deep abdominal muscles.
Start with fixing your deep abdominal and pelvic floor muscles.
When you restored your muscle-mind connection and strength, you can move on to other fitness workouts. Remember to keep them sweet and short if you don’t have much time and you’re tired. These 5 minutes a day are enough to help you rebalance your entire body and stay painfree.
Setting goals that are too high and impossible to achieve will make you resent exercises and feel like a failure.
Moreover, like me, you can end up with adrenal fatigue or even a diastasis recti or other injuries. You have nothing to prove to anyone. Often it takes longer than 6 weeks or 4 months to lose the baby weight, but sacrificing your health to lose it, isn’t a good bargain.
Give your body as much time as it needs, and you will build lasting habit. After you start sleeping more, have more energy and more time, you can start extending the length of your workouts.
If you need help starting to work out in sync with your menstrual cycle and only have energy to exercise 5-min a day join my FB group “5-min workouts for tired mums”. I post a new video every single day.
With love,
Karo