Training the Trainer

Fitness Professionals Need Trainers Too

I always thought I would be that super fit pregnant lady who bounced back to her fit self just moments after giving birth.  Afterall, I am an exercise physiologist.  I worked out multiple times a day and trained clients over 30 hours a week while running a business of managing other wellness professionals.  Fitness and health is in my blood.  This will be easy peasy.  Well, not so much.

In my little perfect world, I didn’t factor in two things, well, three things:

  1.  I didn’t fathom the possibility of not physically feeling well enough to exercise.  My morning, or as I like to call it, “all day long” sickness lasted for more than half the pregnancy.  My hips hurt so bad that I could barely walk.  I had weird ailments, like numbness in my “ring” toe (Is that what it is called?) for almost a month.  I was (am) so ungodly tired.

  2.  I didn’t start my family until I was 35.  I am now 38 with two beautiful girls, two years old and 6 months old.  With age, the metabolism slows down.  Let’s face it, I am tired.  I barely sleep.  My hormone levels are everywhere.  There’s a reason why people have children young.  But despite it being more difficult with age, I wouldn’t have traded enjoying my twenties and early thirties for my selfish self for all the extra weight.  But, none-the-less, the age has added an additional challenge.

  3.  I too, am human.

I always told my clients to not compare themselves to celebrities or anyone else for that matter.  Everyone is different, and most of us cannot afford a personal trainer everyday as well as a private chef.  In addition, those people make their money on looking good.  Millions of dollars can be quite motivating to stay in fabulous shape.  You cannot compare yourself to any friends or family members.  You have to compare yourself to you.  You have to aim to be the best you that you have ever been.

I find myself comparing myself to wanting to be “the me that I was” before I had my first daughter, Scarlett.   Here I am in a bikini just about a year before I got pregnant.  Not in my twenties, but about 34 years old.

And, I still felt overweight.  Do you ever feel the need to just go back in time and shake yourself and tell yourself to shut up?  Well, I need to realize that the girl in the pink bikini is gone.  That doesn’t mean that I cannot get  myself back into fabulous shape, but I am in my late thirties.  I have two babies.  I am still breastfeeding (I am in the lucky smaller percentage that holds onto fat with the additional estrogen I am producing.  Yay me!) My body is just different.  I gained 50lbs with each pregnancy.  I got pregnant with Daphne (my 6 month old) when Scarlett was 9 months old, and I still had 15lbs to lose.

The Author