Post-Pregnancy Body

When I started my blog, I wanted to write so that I would remember everything that I went through as a pregnant woman.  I wanted to be able to go back and see the journey of my pregnancy, especially when I get pregnant again one day and can't remember what I should be going through at what month.  Now my blog has become sort of a journal of my life and things that I love.  I want to remember all of the things that Caycen does when he's little and I want to be able to show that stuff to him later.  It has been so much fun journaling about the things that are important to me.

I have also recently realized that my blog is a great way to help other women as well.  I have had several friends tell me that they are pregnant and love reading my blog and getting a glimpse of what they might go through.  I am super excited about all of the ideas that I have for this blog and ways that I can help others.

Since this blog is supposed to help others I have to be completely vulnerable, so I decided that I would post some pictures of my post-pregnancy body.  Now I have always been a little self-conscious about making sure that I am bikini ready year round and in shape, so this is not like me to show anyone what I look like when I'm not feeling great about my appearance.  But I'm doing it anyway... I know that when I was pregnant I was so interested to see what my body would look like after carrying a huge baby around for 9 months and having my skin stretched to the limit.  I did searches and I couldn't find much, so I want to show others my pictures in case they are curious.

So, I thought that I wouldn't gain TOO much weight during my pregnancy... but I was WRONG!!! Until about 2 weeks before my delivery I had gained about 35 pounds (the doctor said she didn't really want me gaining more than 30).  Then all of a sudden I gained 10 more pounds the last 2 weeks (supposedly all water weight because I was swelling so much)!!! Yep, a total of 45 lbs!!! WOW! Not what I expected at all!

They never weighed me after giving birth at the hospital but the day that I cam home I weighed myself... I only lost 10 stinking pounds!!! 7 lbs and 14 oz of that was just Caycen, so only a couple more than that is what I lost.  How was this possible??? I was so confused.  I heard so many people say that they lost like 15 or 20 lbs right after giving birth, which is what I was COUNTING on! 

Well I was still super swollen for days! I was so swollen and retaining so much water that if you were to barely tough me it would leave an indention.  Some of my family members came to visit me on the Sunday after I had Caycen, which would have been 5 days post-delivery.  They kept saying "wow, you are so swollen and you don't even look like yourself".  Trust me, I didn't FEEL like myself either. 

Then the next day I noticed that most of the swelling had gone down... so I JUMPED on the scale and had lost 10 lbs overnight!!!!! I was SOO pumped!!! So that was a total of 20 lbs down by 6 days post-delivery... that was more like it :)  I don't have any pictures of my belly or anything but you can see in these pictures how swollen I was in the face and all:

Over the next week I was dropping about 2 lbs a day and by 2 weeks I had lost a total of 30 lbs.  What was I doing?? Well, I was breastfeeding/pumping and I didn't have much of an appetite so I was eating very small meals.  Oh and one thing I feel has helped a lot with the shape of my belly is the belly wrap I've been using. It pretty much works like spanx, it holds everything in.  You can find the one that I purchased off of Amazon HERE.  I HIGHLY reccommend it!

At about 3 1/2 weeks post-delivery I was down 35 lbs and I think I have pretty much hit a halting point because I haven't lost any weight in a few days.  Here are some belly pics of me from a couple of nights ago:

My hips are definitely a lot bigger, I have that line still that most pregnant people get (linea negra) - apparently it goes away within the first year, and then I have some stretch marks on my lower stomach (boo!!!)

I have about 10 lbs to go to get to my pre-pregnancy weight, but I want to lose a little more than that to be honest. So here's my plan:

1.  Since I can't start "really" working out until after my 6-week check-up, I will be going on little walks with Caycen.
2.  I am not going to count calories, but I am going to keep my portions small-stop eating when I'm full and eat healthy snacks throughout the day.
3.  I am going to start working out after my 6-week check-up with a walk/jog routine, abs at home, and lots of stretching.
4.  When I feel like I'm back into shape I am going to start the Insanity program again (I did this last year and I loved it!!!).  The workouts are killer but sooo awesome!!!

Hopefully I can do it! I will keep everyone posted on my progress :) Wish me luck!

Love ~ Aimes