Monday, March 3, 2014

Waiting for something big....

So I am not going to start this post saying "I'm back!", (Wait did I just do it?) because I don't know if I am, but I am trying. So let's catch up a bit. The last time I checked in I was anxiously awaiting the arrival of our baby.  Well I waited and waited and on November 20th at 5:51am, my water broke and it was game on! Little did we know this little peanut would take its sweet old time getting here. Apparently my belly is quite comfy and no matter how many contractions I have a baby will stay put until evicted!

After about 24 hours of laboring, 12 naturally and 12 with an epidural, the doctors decided a c-section was the only way to get this baby out. The baby was in position, but would not engage, so they were going in to get it out! Now, this was not part of my original natural birth plan, but I just had to keep reminding myself that the doctors know best so into the operating room we went. Fifteen minutes later at 2:59pm on November 21st, we welcomed Penelope Rose into our family and our world changed in an instant. Life took on a totally new meaning the moment I laid my eyes on her and we have been relishing in this new world for the past 3 months. 

Penny came into this world with gusto. My doctors kept their guesses on her weight at about 8 1/2 pounds max, Penny was 9 pounds 5 ounces. My doctors said she was in position and ready to go, Penny was so big she was stuck. Her butt was stuck under my ribs and her head was sideways, so her nose was stuck on something inside and when she came out it was smooshed to one side. Penny spent the first hour of her life outside of her little belly apartment eating nonstop. When it was time to move to our room we had to pull Penny off of her buffet and her little face was covered in colostrum. I think Penny got here and decided she was going to go big from the start.

Onto fitness news, I had gained a total of 38 pounds in the almost 42 weeks I was pregnant and within the first two days I was down 23. The last time I weighed myself before my training started I had 10 pounds to go. And that is when I decided to let up on the scale, because really, no good could come of it. I am still breast feeding Penny so really it is impossible for me to get an accurate reading on my weight anyway.

So onto training. I had to wait 6 weeks after giving birth to start exercising, but really I don't know where I would have found the time during that 6 weeks to exercise, so the time restraint didn't make much of a difference. Once cleared I decided that I needed a good month to get back into training mode, so I pushed Coach P off one more month for a February start of coached training. I got back into all three disciplines slowly and allowed my body some time to figure out how to train with all of these new changes.

I am now 1 month back into training and feeling great. It is definitely interesting to try balancing my roles of mom and triathlete. And I have to say, I haven't quite mastered it yet. What I have mastered is a new mentality. I now give myself a break when I need it. I know that I can be all things, but that some days you just need to say, "it's ok" if you can't get everything done. There will always be tomorrow to try again.

So back to the title of this blog post. I have been wanting to get back to blogging for quite a bit. I figured when I started back at work and Penny went to daycare I would start blogging again since I would have more time to write. But I wanted to make sure, like with my training, that I was ready and that I wanted to come back. So I figured I would wait until I raced to get back on here and that is what I did last weekend. I was just waitng for something big to report on.

Saturday was my first 5k of the season and my first race in almost a year. Last year around this time I ran my best 5k, not knowing I was pregnant at the time. I ran a 23:20 in February of 2013. This past weekend I came back to the distance and ran a 24:22. Not too shabby if I do say so myself. I ended up 19th out of 140 runners and placed in my division and took home a nice gift card to Dicks.

So it is official, I am back in the game. Now I will spend the next year trying to balance my love of my family and my love for this sport, all while attempting to document the entire process. Wish me luck!