So, finally, after 6 months, I’ve hit my pre-pregnancy weight. It feels good to be back in my old jeans and shorts again! I am still nursing and taking in lots of calories but I’ve been running a good amount.
In September I started training for a 5K that I would run on Thanksgiving. I started out super slowly, doing the Couch to 5K program. I mean slow… My first “run” I walked for 5 mins then ran for 2 then walked for 5 more. Done. It was actually really nice. I felt like I’d accomplished my goal but it wasn’t killing me in the process. I run mostly on a tread mill. (Thankfully, after one really hard go of taking Drake the the embassy gym with me, my friend offered to hang out with him while I ran at her place. I didn’t want to leave him for so long, so this worked out well.) I hate running. I hate running outside for all to see even more. I wasn’t about to do it until I’d built up enough endurance to do it for a long time. Thanksgiving rolled around. My friend had set up a Turkey Trot… up a mountain… so that morning, Patrick and I took the kids in the Phil and Ted’s and “ran” up the mountain on the only “sidewalks” in town… I won’t even bother to tell you how long it took us… a long time.
The next day Patrick said, “We are going to run more. We’re just going to do it. We’ll make a goal, and we’ll get running.” So, we did. We decided we wanted to be able to run 10 miles before we left Cameroon. We had 13 weeks to do this. So we got to running 4 times a week together. At this point I felt good about leaving Drake with our housekeeper for an hour or so while I ran. So, I’ve been meeting Patrick at the embassy gym Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays, then we go in together on Sundays ever since. We run 3 miles on Monday, bc this is the day after our long runs. We run intervals on Wednesday. Then we ran 3-4 miles on Fridays but for the past month or so we’ve been running that 5K up the mountain with our friends on Fridays. Patrick has Friday afternoons off so it allows time for us to go outside to run. I’m glad to say our 5K time has improved leaps and bounds. So encouraging. On Sundays we hire a friend’s daughter to stay with the kids in the afternoons while they nap so we can do our long runs. Last week we were up to 8 miles! I told Patrick we could have run from Eminem’s house all the way to the center of Detroit that day… that was funny at the time… This week we’ll run 8.5, then 9 the next, 9.5 the next until our last weekend here we’ll be at 10 miles! Great.
I still hate running, well, I guess I don’t hate it anymore, I extremely dislike running. I do feel really good afterwards and am really happy to have my body back to normal. I’ve been doing yoga once a week with a few friends as well. I would also like to say that all this running hasn’t really take time away from the kids. About 95% of the time I go while they nap. Just another great reason to have kids on a set schedule, you can have time for yourself. Oh, and lastly, the shower in the gym is almost a bigger reward than the weight loss. The embassy has it’s own well. Which means the water pressure is amazing. There are times I have to get straight home after my run to feed Drake or to get Aydan up from her nap. My shower at home is just not a reward…
So, for those of you out there thinking about starting to run. Just do it. It’s great, you probably have actual sidewalks where you can run, you can probably just put on your shoes and walk out your door with your stroller and get going, stop at a park, have a nice sandwich lunch and then head home to an amazing shower while the kids nap. Running has been really good for me. Whether I want to admit it or not, it has been.
A Diplomat's Wife 