I posted on Facebook that I finally reached my goal weight today. And that Vivienne will be nine months old tomorrow. My friends are so sweet and supportive, congratulating me and making me feel so good about myself. It was mostly other mommies who know we all need a little encouragement every now and then.
You know, I’ve always heard “Nine months on, nine months off,” and to be honest, I’ve always thought that saying was ridiculous. I mean, seriously? It’s going to take nine whole months to lose a litte baby weight? It took me 10 days to lose the weight with our first child, so needless to say, I was a little bit overconfident this time around. Just a little. I think God likes to humble us in our pride sometimes lest we get too crazy.
And, alas, the saying holds true. At least for me, in this season of my life. It did take nine months to lose the weight. And I would love to tell you that all my pre-pregnancy clothes fit me again but at the moment I can only find two pair of jeans in my closet. And almost none of my shirts. I have no idea where all my clothes disappeared to. I’m pretty sure I went on a hormonal rampage while I was huge and pregnant and gave everything to Goodwill, thinking there was no way on God’s green earth that I would ever be able to stuff myself back into those “tiny” things. And “tiny” is a relative term, mind you. Anyway, I’m pretty sure that’s what happened. But I digress.
I reached my goal weight. Yay! I did it by counting calories (super fun) and by running. So, mostly cardio with very little strength training. I just wanted to hit my goal weight, you know? And I figured I was in pretty good shape, right? Uh. That’s a Big. Fat. No.
Today I decided to take a class that a friend teaches at my gym. The only way to describe this class is 45 minutes of supervised torture. I say that in a loving way. I would imagine that it is similar to crossfit (although I’ve never done crossfit), but basically it’s high intensity and you use your own body weight. It’s a lot of squats, lunges, push-ups, abs, burpees, plyometrics, etc… I actually enjoyed the “torture,” and I will go back, but I was stunned at how sore I was immediately following the class. Y’all, I could hardly lift my kids into their carseats. I was struggling to pick Jonah up to put him in the car and I seriously considered flagging down the lady next to me for help. Now that’s desperation! And then, after I showered, I was trying to dry my hair and could hardly lift the hair dryer. I’m serious! I’m sad to say that I ended up putting the hair dryer away and going about my day with semi-wet, frizzy hair. I’m so ashamed. (wink, wink) I’m dreading what I will feel like tomorrow. I’m just hoping I’ll be able to crawl out of bed.
I could go all religious on you and say that just like we need to keep our bodies in shape, we also need to stay in shape by reading the Word and being in constant communication with the Lord. But I’m not going there today. I’m just going to sit here with my feet propped up, and maybe ice some muscle that I didn’t even know I had…
