The secret to making resolutions stick
The best way to reach your personal best is to set a goal. We challenged eight women to push their limits. May their successes (and one change of heart) inspire you.
Burn, Baby, Burn
During my first two pregnancies I didn't do much exercise because I was busy running my cosmetics company. Each time I gained nearly 30 pounds. This time (my third) I told myself I was going to be good. I speed-walked my way through the first and second trimesters and was still walking three miles a day into my eighth month.
What happened? By the time I was ready to give birth to Duke, I'd put on exactly the same amount of weight. Profound realization No. 1: During pregnancy, your body does whatever it wants to do.
My doctor told me I could start exercising again after just two weeks, so naturally I waited only one. I started by walking around the block really slowly, adding 10 minutes each week. By the time Duke was six weeks old, I was walking for an hour. It was time to get serious. Up went the intensity.
My body ached after weight training, so I took up Pilates. It's the perfect mom workout: Stretch and strengthen at home! Now I do Pilates twice a week; the rest of the time I walk, bringing Duke with me when I can (this makes for guilt-free workouts). Occasionally — like when I need a 20-pound weight — Duke becomes the exercise. He's pliable and amenable.
Still, my workouts rarely happen according to schedule. When all hell breaks loose (ear infections, temper tantrums), I call my sister. She has three-year-old twin boys, and she's lost all her weight. She'll tell me to relax — and then sends me a present, like a pair of tights.
Lose Post-Pregnancy Pounds
Unfortunately, you don't shed all your baby weight right after delivery — the average weight loss at birth is 12 to 17 pounds. Plus, it takes about six weeks for the uterus to shrink back to its original size, so don't expect to get your old abs back right away.
Before returning to exercise, make sure you get a doctor's clearance, advises Annette Lang, M.S., a personal trainer at New York's Equinox gym who leads a prenatal certification program for trainers. It usually takes four weeks to be cleared to exercise after a vaginal birth, six to eight weeks after a C-section. This is to enable the pelvic floor to regain some of its strength and for the internal bleeding to decrease.
Don't start out too hard your first time back — maintaining a moderate intensity level is important because you still need ample blood flow going to your core to help the uterus shrink back to pre-pregnancy size. Plus, your hormones are still causing a good amount of joint looseness, putting you at greater risk for injury.
Aerobic Exercise
Even those who exercised throughout their pregnancy are going to find aerobic recovery slowgoing. Your body is tired from childbirth and breastfeeding, and you've lost quite a bit of your cardiovascular capacity. Don't crank up the treadmill to 10 when starting out; work your way up in increments, adding short, high-intensity intervals to boost your threshold. Breastfeeding mothers should note that babies sometimes reject post-exercise milk because your body's lactic acid can alter its taste.
Strength Training
If you did some strength training during pregnancy, you can start pretty much where you left off (strength gains are lost more gradually than aerobic ones). Put special emphasis on the muscles in the lower back (bent-over dumbbell rows will help) and shoulders (pulldowns) to help you lift and carry your baby.
Abdominals
Rather than return to full crunches right away, start with mini-crunches, taking care to tighten the transverse abdominals, the deepest layer of ab muscles (you can feel them tighten just below your ribs when you exhale). Small pulses, rather than big movements, are key. For those who had a C-section, take it even slower — you need to reestablish the nerve connection between your brain and severed muscle fibers. Simply lying on your back and doing isometric contractions of the transverse abdominals may be enough.
It's been 12 weeks and I still have 10 pounds to lose. I have a closet full of size 4 clothes I haven't worn for over a year. But I'm not looking to be skinny. I figure it took nine months for my body to get this way; it may take nine months to get back to normal. By then, who knows? I may be thinking of baby number four.
The Flip Side
Some people link certain smells to childhood, but when I think back, I remember being upside down. My friends and I spent hours tumbling around the backyard pretending to be Olga Korbut. So when Jorge Alzerreca, a personal trainer I know, suggested using gymnastics to get back in shape after the birth of my third child last year, I was excited. I needed a more meaningful goal than fitting into my 501s. Maybe I was too excited. When I told Jorge that what I really wanted to do was a roundoff back handspring — a tumbling sequence where you run, do a cartwheel landing on two legs, throw yourself backward and spring off your hands — he balked: "Your mind may be ready," he said, "but your body's got a lot of catching up to do."
I became even more resolved. Of course, Jorge was right. After three decades of running, aerobics and weight training, I was a total stiff. I couldn't even straddle my legs in a cartwheel. Still, I could picture the trick so vividly! I did a lot of backbends to get limber and got stronger with pushups, situps and jumps. Then I got on a trampoline to practice the movement. It was scary but fun. Doing one on the ground was not fun. It hurt my back, even with Jorge spotting me. More times than I care to tell, I landed on my head and went home sore and shaking. Then one night after weeks of practice, Jorge said it was time to try it alone. I was terrified. I ran. I rounded off. I sprang backward. I did it! And for once, my body was ready and my mind had to catch up: I cried.
Basic Tumbling
Not everyone's going to be able to pull off a stunt like a round off back handspring, even with weeks of practice. But more basic gymnastic moves — from cartwheels and handstands to backbends and walkovers — are great ways to build power, become more flexible and develop a lean, strong body, according to Jorge Alzerreca, a New York personal trainer who incorporates gymnastics into his conditioning programs. Most gymnastics tricks work the upper and lower body at once, as well as the abdominals, which control your center of gravity. "And because you're learning skills that lead to other, more challenging skills," adds Alzerreca, "gymnastics is fun, not work."
Here are three tricks that novices can easily master:
Backbend
Pushing up into a backbend or "bridge" is great for the back, gluteus muscles, shoulders and hamstrings. To begin, lie on your back with your knees and elbows bent and your hands just above your shoulders. Start by lifting your heels up off the ground and lowering them repeatedly to get used to the feeling of contracting your legs. Next step: Try to get your shoulders off the ground by pushing against the ground simultaneously with your arms and legs. Finally, try pushing all the way up into a bridge, making sure your head is off the ground and your back is arched.
Handstand
You can get the hang of a handstand by standing with your back to a wall, bending forward and placing your hands on the floor in front of you, and walking your feet up the wall. Keep your abs as tight as beef jerky or you'll flop over onto your back, warns Alzerreca. To kick into a handstand, lunge forward and use the momentum of your kicking leg to get your body over your hands. Get someone to catch your feet so you can learn to balance. If you start to tip over, tuck your head, bend your arms and do a somersault out of it.
Cartwheel
A cartwheel is basically a sideways handstand. To get a feel for it, stand with your back to a wall, lift your arms above your head, step to one side, bend over (keeping your back against the wall) and kick into a handstand. Be sure you kick hard enough to get your body up over your arms. Once upside down, allow your body to move in an arc above your head until you've lowered your legs again in a full rotation. Keep your abdominals tight and step out of the handstand one leg at a time.
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