Sleep and How Badly Do You Want It?

People ask me often how I am motivated to train, especially with two little boys under the age of two. I'll be honest with you, there are says where I DO NOT feel like training at all. There are days when the last thing I want to do is get my incredibly tired self out of bed and go throw my body under a lot of wight a bunch of times.

But, then I think about my goals.
My goals push me out of bed, when my willpower isn't enough.
So what are my goals?
Here are a few of my BHAGs (Big Hairy Audacious Goals):
I want to be back at 22% body fat. 
I want a double body weight backsquat,
I want to run a marathon.

Being an athlete well rounded enough to squat twice my body weight and be able to run 26 miles?
Those are big goals.Those are get-your-rear-end-out-of-bed-and-get-moving kind of goals. So in order for me to reach those goal, means there are no days off. That is right, I train my body EVERY SINGLE DAY. Now does that mean I train at the same intensity level every day? No way. So how do I decide when to train and when not to train, since I have two little kiddos and tired is just part of this season of life?

If you look at the picture for this article you may recognize it from the dashboard of the FITBIT sleep tracker. This was my sleep pattern this last week and it is actually a great example of all three of my "levels". So lets break them down one by one.

Level 1 is where I get 6 hours of sleep a night. (I am pretty sure when this happens the angels sing and little forest creatures dance around like in sleeping beauty.) This week was a surprisingly good week because I had two whole nights where I got 6 hours of sleep. When that happens I train at 100% of my ability level. That means I lift as heavy as I can, I go hard on conditioning, and I hit the elliptical during my children's nap time. These are my absolute favorite days.   

Level 2 is when I get between 4 and 6 hours of sleep a night. As you can see, this week there were three of those days. When I get this amount of sleep I recognize that my coordination may be a bit off due to my lack of sleep. Because I don't want to risk an injury, I usually drop all of my weights to about 75% of what I would normally lift. I do conditioning, but at a much more scaled version, and I don't do the elliptical, so I am not over stressing my body. These are the most common days for me right now. 

Level 3 seems to be where I was for most of the past month and a half. These are the nights where my 6 month old son won't sleep at all. I have learned that he does best when I am moving, so I strap him in to my Ergo carrier and I get on the elliptical and I get moving. I cannot begin to guess how many miles I have gone on the elliptical in the last two months, but it has been a LOT. The next day when I get up, I still go in to the gym, I still move m body but I do about 25% of my numbers. I don't do conditioning at all. In the evening I take my boys for a long walk through the neighborhood. And that is it because that is all that my body can take on those days. You have to train smart, or you will end up with injuries, and sometimes that means having several level 3 days in a row and that is alright. Thankfully I think that these days may be coming to an end for our family so I will soon be ramping back up to level 2 or 1 every day,

Essentially when I am saying is that when you are the parent of tiny humans, training can be incredibly challenging. However, it absolutely can be done. I watched a mom this week do her entire workout using her 15 month old son as her weight because her babysitter canceled.

Now THAT is dedication.

The best thing that you can do is sit down ahead of time and decide what your threshold is. How many hours of sleep do you need to feel great? How many do you need to feel so-so? How many is just not enough for real training? Decide these ahead of time and then follow your plan. Be smart, and let your body recover and rest, but at the same time don't use having a baby as an excuse to be out of shape. Because at the end of the day the question remains, how badly do you want it?

Ministry Monday: You Aren't Too Young For Ministry

Welcome to the very first Ministry Monday here at Farr Functional Fitness!

If you have been reading our blog for a while or if you follow our Facebook or Pinterest pages you will know that Farr Fitness is a Christian gym ministry. Farr Fitness is run entirely out of our home. We have taken the lower story of our home and dedicated it to Christian ministry. As I said in the Ministry Monday Introduction, the "gym" portion of our ministry is just a means of getting people in the door so that we can love on them the way Christ has loved on us. Yes, we memorize Bible verses. Yes, we pray. Yes, we fellowship together as the body of Christ. Because at the end of the day we want people to see the light of Christ shinning through our lives and actions, the burpees are just a bonus. With that being said, lets jump in to today's Ministry Monday!

When we started our garage gym fitness ministry, we were brand newly married and very young. In fact, Brian was 25 and I was just 24 years old. Brian had had the gym long before we were married, but up until that point it was just friends working out together. It didn't take the form of a real ministry until about six months before we left Fort Hood. We suddenly had an influx of young soldiers looking for information on how to train their bodies and how to live life as godly Christian men. 

Brian and I spoke with our mentors, did careful research, and prayed a lot during this time. 

God opened doors left and right. 

Then we PCSed to North Carolina.

When we got to Fort Bragg our ministry blew up. In the 2.5 years that we have been here we have had over 350 people come through our gym. 350 people have been in our home at least one time. Many have stayed for months. Some have stayed for years. 

All of these people have been brought to us by God in one way or another and yet somehow we often have people tell us that we are "doing it wrong". We often have people tell us that we are too young for ministry. More than once we have had people tell us that we are too young to have an in home ministry and that we need to be taking this time to focus on building up our family. I won't lie to you, a couple of times we faltered, thinking that maybe they were right. Maybe we are too young for this, and we should just raise our family until our kids are grown and THEN we can "do ministry".  

However, every single time that we have been tempted by this thought God has brought a person or an event in to our lives that reminds us of our purpose. Most recently my friend Carrie quoted 1 Timothy 4:22 when I was struggling with feeling under-qualified to minister to someone older than me. It says, "Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity." This has been on my heart heavily the last few weeks. 

If God has called you to do something, do it.  Period, end of story. It doesn't matter what the opposition says, it doesn't matter if you don't fit the "normal" standard. (My mother-in-law would tell you that normal is just a setting on the dryer!) Behave in a way that makes others ask how you do it. If God has called you to something HE WILL OPEN DOORS that you simply cannot imagine. If God wants you to be somewhere or do something He will provide a way for you to do it. Your age, race, social standing, education... none of it matters to the creator of the universe. 

If God is calling you, yes even the young, go and do what He has asked. 

Ministry Monday: Get Yourself a Mentor

Welcome to the very first Ministry Monday here at Farr Functional Fitness!

If you have been reading our blog for a while or if you follow our Facebook or Pinterest pages you will know that Farr Fitness is a Christian gym ministry. Farr Fitness is run entirely out of our home. We have taken the lower story of our home and dedicated it to Christian ministry. As I said in the Ministry Monday Introduction, the "gym" portion of our ministry is just a means of getting people in the door so that we can love on them the way Christ has loved on us. Yes, we memorize Bible verses. Yes, we pray. Yes, we fellowship together as the body of Christ. Because at the end of the day we want people to see the light of Christ shinning through our lives and actions, the burpees are just a bonus. With that being said, lets jump in to today's Ministry Monday!

Today I want to talk to you about mentorship. 

To begin we need to first address what a mentor is, since it is a word that is thrown around often in today's society. Google defines a mentor as, 

... a person or friend who guides a less experienced person by building trust and modeling positive behaviors. An effective mentor understands that his or her role is to be dependable, engaged, authentic, and tuned into the needs of the mentee.

For once, I agree with google! I think that this is a great definition. But enough with the vocabulary lesson, what does mentoring have to do with ministry?

I believe that you cannot be in Christian ministry without mentorship. Sure you can try, but you will quickly fail. The Christian walk is incredibly difficult, especially in today's society. Even Paul, author of 14 books in the New Testament and arguably one of the greatest men of faith in Christian history,   had a mentor. His name was Barnabas and you can read more about their mentor relationship in Acts 9:26-30. 

So what does this have to do with us?
Hebrews 13:7 says, "Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith." So, it seems to me that we are told to follow in the path of those who have been here before us. 

Ministry isn't new. It has been done before. 

Maybe you are doing ministry in a new and different way (like having a garage gym ministry for military service-members and their families) but ultimately the goal is the same. It doesn't matter if you are trying to build wells in Africa or teaching the squat clean at Fort Bragg, the goal is to bring people to Christ and help them reach spiritual maturity. 

(Want to know more about spiritual maturity? Check out what the Navigators say here.)

So reach out. 

If you are ready to do ministry, reach out to someone that you respect and ask them how they do it. Learn from them. Put yourself under their authority. Learn from their wisdom and their mistakes. Listen to their critique and criticism with humility and grace. We have enough to fight in our society and culture without trying to reinvent the wheel while trying to serve Christ. 

We have been given Titus 2 men and women that can help us in our journey, we just need to be brave enough to ask. But be ready to go in search of them. Great mentors are not walking around looking for mentees. Great mentors are often incredibly busy... DOING WHAT GOD CALLED THEM TO DO! 

So go ask.

Find a wise woman in your church and ask if you can come clean house with her and discuss how to improve your ministry. Go with the guy who is rebuilding his elderly neighbor's fence and offer your free labor as you ask him about balancing ministry and family. 

Get out there, get in the game. Time is wasting and you don't have to waste anymore of it trying to redo what has already been done. Find your mentors and get to know them, build the relationships.

We are called to be fishers of men, so get fishing. 

Ministry Monday: Introduction

Welcome to the very first Ministry Monday here at Farr Functional Fitness!

If you have been reading our blog for a while or if you follow our Facebook or Pinterest pages you will know that Farr Fitness is a Christian gym ministry. Farr Fitness is run entirely out of our home. We have taken the lower story of our home and dedicated it to Christian ministry.

Ministry is a word that is thrown around often in church circles, but many people do not understand what exactly it means. The word "ministry" actually comes from the Greek word diakoneo which means to serve. We are provided with an excellent example of Christian ministry in the New Testament through the works of Jesus Christ and His followers, who served in His name. The 2003 Encyclopedia of Christianity defines ministry as carrying forth Christ's mission in the world, it also states that it is conferred on each Christian in baptism.

So just to be clear, all Christians are to have a ministry of some sort (it will vary depending on the skills/giftings/opportunities that God gives you). It can be hard to figure out how and what to do to better serve the kingdom of God. As such, we have decided to use our blog to show a little bit more of what exactly that looks like.

We will be using this new segment of our blog each week to:

• encourage others in ministry,
• explain about why ministry is important
• show how we organize ministry/life
• hold us accountable for being more than just a gym  

Rich Mullins said it best when he stated the following: 

“I would like to encourage you to stop thinking of what you're doing as ministry. Start realizing that your ministry is how much of a tip you leave when you eat in a restaurant; when you leave a hotel room whether you leave it all messed up or not; whether you flush your own toilet or not. Your ministry is the way that you love people. And you love people when you write something that is encouraging to them, something challenging. You love people when you call your wife and say, 'I'm going to be late for dinner,' instead of letting her burn the meal. You love people when maybe you cook a meal for your wife sometime, because you know she's really tired. Loving people - being respectful toward them - is much more important than writing or doing music.” 

The "gym" portion of our ministry is just a means of getting people in the door so that we can love on them the way Christ has loved on us. Yes, we memorize Bible verses. Yes, we pray. Yes, we fellowship together as the body of Christ. Because at the end of the day we want people to see the light of Christ shinning through our lives and actions, the burpees are just a bonus. 

C-Section Saturday: Be Ready For What It Looks Like

Welcome to the Farr Fitness' C-Section Saturdays. 

As I have mentioned before I will be using Saturdays to discuss, teach, and learn about C-Section recovery for athletes. Be prepared, some of the information that we discuss will be graphic, but I assure you that I will do my best to cover each topic with the grace of the true southern lady that I am. With that being said lets jump in! 

Today I want to talk about expectations and reality. Things tend to go one of two ways with postpartum expectations. They usually end up being something like this:

"oh my gosh, my body is going to bounce right back and it is going to be wonderful" 

or 

"I hate everything I am going to fall face first in a box of doughnuts since I'm eating for two now anyways."  

And neither of these are good. 

The reality is, your body won't bounce right back. It takes time to heal from the trauma of pregnancy, let alone birth or worse, a C-Section. Your body will not look the way it did originally, no matter what magazines, advertisements, and fitness gurus tell you. You pushed a human being (or had one pulled) out of you, that changes a body. 

The other option of "I'm nursing so now I can finally eat for two" is not right either. You have to take care of your body. This is not the time to give up on yourself. Take the extra step, make the extra effort to eat real and healthy food. Get up and move your body as soon as the doctor clears you to do so. You can't take care of a precious newborn baby with zero energy. 

In reality your body will be different, and you need to be ready for that. In fact, I remember thinking that I was marred for life when I first saw my incision. I cried alone in the bathroom at the hospital nine hours after my first son was born. If you want to see what a C-section body looks like you can see those images here. Be prepared, it isn't always pretty at first. If you don't like where your body is after your C-Section, get up, and change it. 

Put one foot in front of the other. 

Don't quit, don't stop. 

You can do this. 

Psalm 139;19 says that "God knit me together in my mother's womb". Isn't it amazing to be a part of the miracle of birth? Isn't it amazing what God made our bodies to do? Your body will look different. Your body will feel different. But your body is incredible and don't you let anyone tell you otherwise.

C:Section Saturday: Make a Plan and Stick With It!

Welcome to the Farr Fitness' C-Section Saturdays. 

As I have mentioned before I will be using Saturdays to discuss, teach, and learn about C-Section recovery for athletes. Be prepared, some of the information that we discuss will be graphic, but I assure you that I will do my best to cover each topic with the grace of the true southern lady that I am. With that being said lets jump in!

Today I want to talk about the number one question I get as a gym owner. Do you want to guess what it is? Here are a few runners up:

Should I buy a treadmill? 

Maybe I should build my own garage gym? 

Should I see a dietitian? 

Would paying a personal trainer be best? 

Should I sign up for a workout subscription? 

But, the NUMBER ONE QUESTION that I get asked is: how do I get fit? 

Here is the trick... there is no trick. 

You simply have to choose/make a plan and stick to it. 

People get so caught up in the idea that they have to have the exact perfect plan and if you don't then your whole fitness effort is in vain. That simply isn't true! That, to me, is like the people that can only start eating healthy on a Monday. If they miss the Monday start time they have to wait an ENTIRE WEEK to start again. 

I have written recently about my various successes in the gym and with my body composition. You can read about those topics here and here. If you want to get fit and healthy, start like I did, simply.  Fitness really isn't that complicated! Pick there manageable goals and go from there. 

My manageable goals were: 

• move my body as often as possible. 
• eat real food
• sleep as much as I can

That was my simple plan. After a couple of weeks of success with this plan I then added to it. 

"Move my body as much as possible" became walking on the elliptical, then running on the elliptical, and now I am running my mile for time, 

"Eat real food" started with cutting out Dr. Pepper, then it moved to eating more meat and vegetables, now I am doing a Whole30. 

"Sleep as I can" is hard since I have a four month old. This originally looked like the traditional, "sleep when baby sleeps", then I put Henry on a schedule, and now he is sleeping through the night and I am back to using sleep cycles to get the best rest possible. 

Do not stress yourself out, post C-section mamas (or anybody for that matter!) the process is much more simple than the magazines would have you believe. You don't need a ton of equipment and you don't need super expensive supplements and meal plans. What you need is to make a simple plan and stick with it. Don't believe my story? Check out the stories of my friends Denise and Rachel. 

Need help coming up with a plan? Contact us at FarrFunctionalFitness@gmail.com and we can help make a personalized plan to fit your goals. 

At the end of the day you are a child of God and you are incredible. Get out there and move your body. Take care of the gift that God has given you.

Parenting vs Coaching

As a coach I carefully watch each athlete's movements. I keep detailed records of each one of my athletes. I can tell you that athlete R has a goofy elbow, athlete M has horrible shin splints when she runs, and athlete C is never fully confident that she is going to get the lift, even when the lift is over. I can tell you which days in the last year (that they have been training with me) that the athlete was sick and what they were sick with. I can tell you when their anniversary is, and what their favorite pass times are. 

A good coach knows more about their athletes than just their numbers. 

A good coach knows their lives, their stories, their dreams. 

Parenting is no different. 

The definition of a coach is someone who instructs or trains a performer or team. The definition of a parent is to raise, bring up, look after, take care of. Being a coach and being a parent really aren't that different, and yet I struggle more with one than I do with the other.

People ask me often if it is hard to run a garage gym ministry and have two children under the age of two. I will be honest, there are days where it is very challenging. The selfish side of me would love to get through coaching all of my classes without my son interrupting. I would love to get through my own personal training without having to stop to nurse the 4 month old. But that is just my selfish sin nature talking.

When an athlete comes in my gym I ask them how they are feeling, if anything hurts. I ask them about their weekend. I listen to their marriage struggles, personal difficulties, and parenting challenges. 

Do I offer the same dedication to my children? 

Today I was convicted about exactly that. I was trying to coach my beginner athlete class. It is loud, hot, and I am tired from being up with the 4 month old in the middle of the night.   

As I was rubbing my pounding head, my not quite two year old went outside the garage and picked up a handful of crepe myrtle flowers from the ground and brought them to me. Instead of graciously accepting his precious gift, I barked at him to get out of the gym. Seeing his little face fall, as he is still trying to give me his flowers, my heart broke. God spoke to my heart through the big blue eyes of my oldest son. Today God reminded me that my job is to care for, teach, and minister to my family first. I need to remember my calling from God, and not worry about what other people will think. I can't make an idol of coaching exactly the way we would in the classes where there are no children. 

That just isn't reality.  

I had a very wise friend remind me recently that God has given me these precious little boys for a short time, and that time is flying by. 

Lets do a little math right quick:

There are roughly 52 Saturdays in a  calendar year. 

That means that we have roughly 936 Saturdays from the time your child is born until your child leaves for college. 

William is 20 months old. 

We have used up 87 Saturdays of his life already. 

We only have 849 Saturdays left with him. 

That is it.

So now my focus is going to change a bit. 

Don't worry, I will still correct form, I will still be an aggressive coach for my athletes, but secondary to being a godly parent for my sons.

C-Section Saturday: 12 Weeks Post-Op

Welcome to the Farr Fitness' C-Section Saturdays. 

As I have mentioned before I will be using Saturdays to discuss, teach, and learn about C-Section recovery for athletes. Be prepared, some of the information that we discuss will be graphic, but I assure you that I will do my best to cover each topic with the grace of the true southern lady that I am. With that being said lets jump in! 

This post is going to cover weeks 9-12 of my recovery. This last month I have learned a lot about taking care of myself and my family while I'm trying to train. Here are a few of the things that I have learned.

It is July here in North Carolina and it is HOT. The heat index for today is 105. Let me tell you, I feel it.  

I am also relearning how to train through menstrual pain. Having our boys so close together, I didn't have a period between Having William and getting pregnant with Henry. That means that I haven't had to deal with this issue since December of 2013! I had forgotten what it can be like. 

Training when you have a 3 month old isn't easy. In fact it takes everything that I have to get up each day and make it happen, especially on nights when Henry doesn't sleep through the night. 

But, if I don't do it now I will spend years of my life hating my body. 

So for me it really is a question of how badly do I want it? Do I want it badly enough to train when it isn't easy?

Yesterday for example I did my standard strength training and the conditioning workout Rachel, which is: 

6 RFT (Rounds For Time). 

15 KBS (Kettlebell swings) 

1 loop run 

I swung a 25 pound kettlebell American (meaning overhead) 90 times and ran the loop 6 times despite the fact that I was up every hour and half with my son the night before. 

I won't lie to you, it was hard. 

It was ugly. 

I did it in 8 minutes and 25 seconds. Next time that I do it (which will be in about 6 weeks) I want to have it down to 8 mins flat. That is how you train with a 3 month old. You accept that there will be things that you cannot change, like Henry waking up a bunch. What I can control is my willingness to suck it up and train hard anyway. 

So here is the scary part. From here on out I will post up pictures of my physical progress once a month. Part of this is accountability and part of it is to help other C-section moms see what normal looks like. Twelve weeks post C-section, this is what I looked like: 

Weight- 194.3 lbs

Body Fat Percentage- 42.77%
Waist (narrowest point)- 38 inches
Navel- 38 inches
Hips- 45.5 inches
Thigh- 26 inches
Neck- 15 inches
Bicep- 12.75 inches
Forearm- 11 inches
Wrist- 7 inches

I will admit that seeing this is hard for me. But I don't have to stay here. Yes I had major abdominal surgery so I need to train smart and safe You can read the training plan that I am following here.

The real question isn't if I can do it, it is how badly do I want it?

Psalm 139;19 says that "God knit me together in my mother's womb". Isn't it amazing to be a part of the miracle of birth? Isn't it amazing what God made our bodies to do? Your body will look different. Your body will feel different. But your body is incredible and don't you let anyone tell you otherwise.

C-Section Saturday: 9 Pounds & 6 Inches

Welcome to the Farr Fitness' C-Section Saturdays. 

As I have mentioned before I will be using Saturdays to discuss, teach, and learn about C-Section recovery for athletes. Be prepared, some of the information that we discuss will be graphic, but I assure you that I will do my best to cover each topic with the grace of the true southern lady that I am. With that being said lets jump in! 

Can I tell you something that drive me crazy? When people say that they can't afford to get fit. I hear it a lot especially from moms. People have bought in to this idea that you have to have powders, special containers, and pills to get fit. 

That simply isn't true. 

Fitness isn't built on what the magazines and social media tries to tell us. Think about it for a second. How many people do you know selling "health and fitness" stuff. It comes in the form of powders, pills, and "coaching" from people that have ZERO qualifications. They post up pictures of themselves after however many weeks claiming that their powders, pills, and potions made the difference. 

Let me tell you a little secret... 

You don't need it. 

In the last four weeks I lost 9 pounds and 6 inches of fat. 

Guess how many powders I drank? 

ZERO.

 Guess how many pills I took? 

None.

You know what I did? 

I worked out consistently, every single day. 

I ate REAL food, every single meal.

That is it. 

  

This is where people will say, "Cooking healthy is too hard and I can't afford a gym membership". 

Let me help you with that:

Here is a link to our at home workouts. 

These require a jump rope as your only piece of equipment. 

Don't have a real jump rope? use a piece of rope. 

Do two workouts a day four days a week. 

Don't like those workouts? Here is a running plan designed for de-conditioned athletes. 

I started this program 6 weeks after major abdominal surgery. If I can do it, you can do it. 

Nutrition doesn't have to be complicated. Here is my list of 14 healthy crock pot freezer meals. When I  purchased everything on the shopping list it came out to $171.83 for 14 dinners. There were leftovers for all of them so that comes out to 28 meals for 171.83. That comes out to $6.13 per meal for both my husband and me. 

Finally, don't wait. Don't stall. 

If you want to get fit, do it. 

You don't get a restart on this life. 

You will never be younger than you are now. 

Get up, get moving. 

You can do this. 

C-Section Saturday: 7 Reasons to avoid a C-Section

Welcome to the Farr Fitness' C-Section Saturdays. 

As I have mentioned before I will be using Saturdays to discuss, teach, and learn about C-Section recovery for athletes. Be prepared, some of the information that we discuss will be graphic, but I assure you that I will do my best to cover each topic with the grace of the true southern lady that I am. With that being said lets jump in! 

Recently I wrote a post in which I said that I would strongly counsel any woman against a C-section. I experienced a lot of backlash about that post, and I would like to set the record straight. Make no mistake, while I encourage women to recover from their C-sections, I do not encourage women to have C-sections at all. There are several reasons for that, and I'll get to those in a minute but first, have you ever seen a C-section? Go ahead and take a look at this one.

 I'll wait. 

Ok, now that you have that lovely little gem in your mind, realize that was just a short clip. The real deal is not nearly as simple as they make it look on television. 

In the United States of America, the C-section rate is up to 33%. They are having their abdomen cut open, in order to bring a child in to this world. Think about that for just a second. 33% of all women giving birth in the USA are doing so via C-section.  If 33% are doing it, why then do I counsel against it? Here are my 7 Reasons to avoid a C-Section

• A C-Section is a major abdominal surgery. It therefore comes with all the risks of major surgery.   
• The recovery is months to years (depending on how yours went) despite what doctors may tell you. You just put your body through an incredible marathon event (pregnancy) that requires recovery and now you have to recover from major surgery as well.
• That awful pulling you feel on one side of your incision,.. yeah that doesn't ever go away. In fact, you can expect to feel that for the rest of your life. 
• Oh and on the other side you might be like me and experience complete numbness. No feeling, at all. 
• Breastfeeding an infant (especially a larger one!) when your abdomen is cut open is incredibly painful. Many C-section mothers find themselves unable to continue nursing due to the amount of pain it places on their abdomens.
• Despite the work of birth rights activists across the country, the old adage of "once a C-section, always a C-section" is still very true. Just because a VBAC is listed as a service at a hospital doesn't mean that it is encouraged or even really offered to expecting mothers.
• If you notice that baby was puled away from mama just as soon as it was out. That is common practice with C-sections in the United States. I was not able to see either of my boys after they were born until I was moved in to recovery. It doesn't exactly allow for mother and child bonding. 

In conclusion, I am grateful that C-sections exist or my sons and I might not. They are a wonderful tool to save the lives of women and children in danger. However, the use of C-sections to avoid labor pains or to prevent "vaginal stretching" is a gross misuse of modern medicine. Before you allow doctors to talk you in to an elective C-section because it will be easier, please carefully do your own research to determine if that is the right choice for you. If I could go back in time and somehow magically be able to give birth naturally (and safely) to my boys, and avoid the horrific scars and lengthy recovery time, I would.

C-Section Saturday: Getting Back to Work

Welcome to the Farr Fitness' C-Section Saturdays. 

As I have mentioned before I will be using Saturdays to discuss, teach, and learn about C-Section recovery for athletes. Be prepared, some of the information that we discuss will be graphic, but I assure you that I will do my best to cover each topic with the grace of the true southern lady that I am. With that being said lets jump in! 

Normally when a mom says that she is getting back to work after having a baby, people envision a woman going back to an office job of some sort or maybe back in to a classroom. My world doesn't work quite like that. For me, getting back to work means getting back to the gym. 

Don't get me wrong. I have coached while I was recovering, but up until this point I had hardly lifted at all. I had picked up weights to put them away, or lifted the occasional 45 pound bar for a smaller athlete. But that is it. 

I missed it, a lot.  

Brian and I went out in an evening when we didn't have training and he helped me work up to workable numbers for all of our lifts. I was so encouraged at the end of the session. It felt so good to put my body through the movements again. At the same time though, it was SUPER humbling to have to start at 5 pounds on every single lift. 

But, you have to start somewhere. 

So, for all of you other athletes out there, here are my numbers 8 weeks post C-Section:

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I will admit that seeing these numbers is hard for me. 

But I don't have to stay here. 

Yes I had major abdominal surgery so I need to train smart and safe. I have now been training cardio a whole two weeks and this is my first day back to strength training. I know that it is going to be a long and slow road, but I am ready. 

The real question isn't if I can do it, it is how badly do I want it?

Psalm 139;19 says that "God knit me together in my mother's womb". Isn't it amazing to be a part of the miracle of birth? Isn't it amazing what God made our bodies to do? Your body will look different. Your body will feel different. But your body is incredible and don't you let anyone tell you otherwise.