Final countdown

The arrival of Baby H is imminent. I have no idea how imminent but they will be here soon nonetheless. There have been a few hiccups in these final weeks but fingers crossed the big day will be a bit more straightforward.

A few final observations:

Pregnancy has not been easy for me, and there have been a number of difficulties along the way. There's not been any period where I have felt I have breezed along. I just keep focusing on what will be the end result. These final weeks have seemed especially long, but that's only natural. You want them to go quickly but at the same time you want them to go slow. You are desperate to meet your baby and to have the pregnancy over, but then you also know that your life will completely change once the baby is here, oh, and there's that minor process of labour to go through in order to get to the next phase. I have absolutely no idea when baby will arrive, and apparently you can't even sense it is coming. It is always a bit of a surprise (unless it is a planned c-section/indcton). So it's a wait-and-see game now.

It seems I have succumb to the dreaded stretchmarks :-( but they're not as bad as most bumps I have seen. They really just appeared in these final weeks and really only seem to have spread out from my appendectomy scar. Perhaps the skin in that area was more susceptable to them because of the scar, who knows. One thing is for sure, it doesn't seem to matter how much you spend on fancy creams and oils (guilty), you can't stop them if you're going to get them. I guess they really are just a genetic thing. I can't imagine I will be exposing my poor ravaged stomach to the glorious toastiness of the Mediterranean sun anytime soon but it's disappointing thinking I may have to resign myself to takinis and swimsuits rather than bikinis in the future. I have been told that the marks will die down over time so here's hoping.:-)

The weight I have gained is quite scary. It's almost double what I had hoped for. My legs and back feel permanently weak due to the weight and I really can't wait to see the numbers on the bathroom scales to start going down instead of up. I know a lot of weight for me is due to fluid retention. This is something I have suffered quite badly from. The swelling in my hands/arms and legs/feet has at times been quite extraordinary. I have never seen anything like it, not even after the WHW or Tooting. The movement becomes quite limited and the pain in my hands has been really bad. Thankfully that pain has died down this week. I look forward to being able to wear actual shoes again - what a novelty that will be ha ha.

I have been sorting through my running files to get myself ready for next year. I usually keep a record of results from races I have done. Needless to say, that file is very sparse this year and didn't take long to organise lol.
I have been collecting articles from magazines through the year to help me work out a plan to return to running. There is a general opinion that a woman should wait 4-6 weeks after a straight-forward labour before returning to exercise. I plan to go along with this depending on how my body feels. The first few weeks I hope to be able to get out for lots of walks with the baby but I suppose that will depend on whether or not we get this predicted early snow or not! (I really hope it doesn't come!)

Hopefully before Christmas I'll have started on a few walk/runs but we'll see how things progress. I don't want to risk causing myself any un-necessary. I am trying to look at the upcoming period (in terms of running) as both 'starting from scratch' and 'recovery'. I thought it best to look at my body as one mass of injuries, gradually rebuilding back the strength and flexibility as if I was rehabilitating a series of injuries. I thought it would be safer for me to err on the side of caution rather than head full steam ahead into some excessive training plan.

There are more important things in life than running. This has never been more apparent than now, but I know that running will help me feel more like my old self and regain control of my own body again. It will be all about getting the right balance.

So let the waiting commence...