Post-Baby Comeback Training Update: 6 weeks postpartum

Important Note: I was cleared by both my Doctor and my Women's Health Physical Therapist BEFORE returning to any type of running postpartum. I strongly recommend that anyone returning to running postpartum meet with a Women's Health Physical Therapist prior to resuming any kind of running.

Since my plan to return to running is a more conservative and more structured than most I though I'd give weekly training updates. I'll be sharing resources for great postpartum strengthening workouts and also logging my runs.

This past week was my second week of running, after being cleared to run by my physical therapist. I started with three hill repeats and increased to four hill repeats this past week. Each repeat is a half mile and about 200 feet in elevation gain and I continue to walk down the hill to keep the workout low impact.

I'm also staying consistent with Kegel exercises and pelvic floor specific strengthening.

Some of my workouts have been in the evening after the kids are in bed and a few were in the morning. Thanks to Liam being a great sleeper I've been able to start to get back into the morning workout routine.

Here's how my week shaped up:

Monday: (evening) 40 minutes of Sleek Technique barre DVD. This isn't necessarily a hard hitting cardio workout, although I do work up a sweat it mostly targets the core and legs. It is different from the barre class that I take in a studio, which integrates more cardio moves that really get the heart pumping. I'm looking forward to getting back to class and probably will in another week or two. I had a very mild, one finger diastasis, but would still have to modify a lot of the moves so I'll wait a little longer.

Tuesday: (morning) Stationary bike for 20 minutes followed by 2x20 pull-ups, reverse push-ups, kettle bell swings and single leg bridges and a few physical therapy moves.

Wednesday: (evening) Running. Hill Repeats 4x 1/2 mile hill. 4:52/4:53/4:53/4:47 Each repeat was a 20+ second improvement from last weeks times. I felt strong.

Thursday: (morning) Found a postpartum pilates workout on YouTube called Poise. The video was very gentle, but had some good moves. There seemed to be a lot of "dead time" between each move, so I paused on each exercise and performed more reps before moving on. I followed that up with a one mile walk on the treadmill alternating 6% and 12% incline. I was going to do a few upper body exercises but then the kids were up and wanting breakfast.

Friday: rest

Saturday: (morning) Running. Hill Repeats 4x 1/2 mile hill. My splits were not nearly as fast as they were on Wednesday, but I'll chalk that up to running first thing in the morning on an empty stomach. My lungs felt strong, but my legs felt dead. 5:05/4:52/5:06/5:15.