Hard Core to Nothing at All

Pretty much my exercise life is non-existent. It's so strange, part of what makes the last couple of months seem like a year instead of just a few weeks. A few months ago I was at the gym nearly every day and I always put in more than an hour of exercise a day (sometimes up to three hours, if I had a long bike ride planned). The regular lap swimmers were part of my morning social chatting, and the ladies at the front desk at the gym didn't even bother to ask for my ID anymore because they could just type in my info by heart.

I haven't been back to the gym since that first week after I found out I was pregnant.

What happened? Surely I should still be able to at least moderately exercise? All the baby books say so, anyway. Well, I'm a tricky case I guess. I'm labeled a high risk pregnancy from the get-go, for multiple reasons. One is my history of miscarriage. My doctor let me know a couple of pregnancies ago that exercise more strenuous than walking is out for me until I'm out of the first trimester. But then with K and B I ended up on bedrest and medication for going into labor too early, so now I'm restricted from anything more than walking my whole pregnancy. Oh well. This time my OB is talking about maybe "restricting my activities" (i.e. modified bedrest) in my 2nd trimester before I have any contractions, given my history and that they can't even do the progesterone shots with me this time (I developed an allergy to them the last time).

Sheesh.

So much for the wisdom of "you can keep up the exercise as long as you don't overdo it." Well, I'd probably still be going to the gym right now anyway, at least to walk on the treadmill or swim, if it weren't for the morning sickness. Quite frankly, I just don't feel like doing anything. It's the most I can do to get the absolute basics done each day, and unfortunately, the basics right now do not include the gym.

But it worries me.

What if I am just going back to my unhealthy no exercise habits? Granted, I have to go all the way back to pre-M to get to days when I didn't do any exercise at all, but I'm terrified this time of gaining a ton of weight back and not being able to get it off again. I'm afraid that my triathlon and Ragnar-running days are going to turn out to been only a pleasant memory of a brief time when I was a dedicated athlete.

It's silly, I know. But after six of my pregnancies, I finished with extra weight that never left. The first one ended so early that fortunately I had not gained any weight, but it was only the eighth one that was really different. So I guess I'm scared that the ninth will repeat old history. Terence says I'm being irrational, and that's probably true. But this isn't exactly a rational time for me.

Ah, the joys of pregnancy.