Ashley is a new mom. She joined QSF last fall upon relocating to Kingston from Victoria with her husband Frank, and with her little one on-the-way. As someone who trained regularly for years before pregnancy, she continued exercising consistently all the way through. It was exciting and inspiring to see Ashley discover what was possible for her and her body throughout the changes that came with growing a tiny human. 

Dante is now seven and a half months and Ashley holds a new perspective and appreciation for fitness as a new mama. Read on to learn from Ashley’s experience and what shifts in mindset allowed her to thrive during this unique phase. 

What has it been like being back in the gym since he was born?
It’s been awesome to find time for myself, though it has had different phases. At the beginning it was really easy to bring him, he would just sleep so I could come in and do some rehab work and he would stay relatively relaxed…then that became more difficult. Then, even just getting here became more difficult. Once he started getting more active and I was still off work. My goal was to come to the gym 3 times/week, and I’d be lucky to get 2 days, for the first 4-5 months.

I definitely gained a new appreciation for new moms and how difficult it is to make time for yourself, and to make time to work out. It isn’t just as simple as fitting it in, there’s a lot more to it. 

Was that different than you expected?
Yeah, totally. I just thought “well I’ll just make time for it, I’ll just always make time for it”, but there really is just so much else going on, and you’re exhausted. Making time for it sometimes feels more like I should actually make time to nap instead.

Did you have specific ideas about how your postpartum journey would look?

For me, I had an emergency C-section so that was not at all what I thought would happen. So I was starting from a different place. My main goals when I began were to get back into breathwork, to find my core and pelvic floor, following recommendations from my pelvic floor physiotherapist. I also spent a lot of time working on basic balance and stability. All my single leg strength and stability seemed to sort of leave me for a little while when I was in those early stages, so that was a huge focus for me. 

Did you have timelines in mind of what you thought you’d be able to do by a certain time? 
I knew that I wanted to start moving before the 6-week mark, and I did. I was very cautious throughout that and just thought about the breath, nothing beyond a very light upper body exercise, just focusing on form and tempo. By the time I got to 6 weeks I guess in a way I thought I would be farther. I thought I would be ready for more intensity and I absolutely was not at that stage. So that was a bit of a wake-up call but no real specific timelines. I was trying to be generous with myself.

What do you think was not in place in order for you to be able to push the intensity at that time?
Basic core strength. Any time that I would do anything that would tax out my core, I would feel my hip flexors and I would start to feel a little bit of sensation in my pelvic floor which I just knew wasn’t what I should be feeling before I pushed the intensity. So I told myself it’s all about going slow and steady, and playing the long game instead of trying to get back to things as quickly as possible. 

Were there things that you were able to practice by working out through your pregnancy that helped you post-partum?
Definitely. I kept a huge emphasis on core work actually while I was pregnant. Not your typical sit-ups and of course no GHDs, but things like stability pieces; palloff presses, planks, things like that. And I think that gave me a really good baseline as I was coming back and so I was using early post-partum training in pursuit of the level I was at when I was about 38-weeks pregnant. 

Also the mindset. My mindset had to shift during pregnancy when I was in a group class I had to think “okay, how am I feeling? What is my breath doing? All of those types of things instead of letting myself fall into comparison mode and think, ‘oh, so-and-so- is going this fast, I should push myself too’. I’ve definitely kept that attitude up post-partum, keeping the blinders on to a degree and focusing on my own workout, not worrying about where everybody else is.

Did the ‘hierarchy of needs’ apply to your post-partum journey? How so?
Absolutely. When we talk about the base of the hierarchy, we talk about recovery- sleep, diet and stress. Sleep and stress were the two big ones. I feel lucky that I feel pretty confident in the way I’m fuelling my body but definitely getting enough sleep is its own beast in the first few months. I actually did have to prioritize that quite a few times. If I only slept for 4 hours last night, I wouldn’t go to the gym that day. I knew I wasn’t going to make any progress that way, I knew I’d be better served by napping when Dante napped instead. That was a big shift, but it was helpful to have that framework to apply. 

Once you were a few months down the road and you had that base, then what did the next couple stages look like?
The next stage of the hierarchy is the flexibility and mobility, and for me I actually had really great range of motion throughout my pregnancy, maybe even better than before, and that’s continued post-partum so that’s been a nice benefit. But it’s been working on strength and control in the different positions that I’ve felt challenging, especially in unilateral (single sided) movements, so I began loading things like single leg deadlifts, split squats, following a tempo strength training program for the first 8 weeks after the initial rehab stage (which took me until about 3 months post partum).

What kind of skills have you built back to now?
Now I’m back to my all-time favourites; burpees, box-jumps and high volume wall-balls- unpopular opinions I know. I can definitely handle the volume of training a lot more which is really nice, and I’ve been able to push the intensity more. The biggest thing that I’m working on now is my pulling strength. It took years to get a strict pull-up before pregnancy, and now that’s gone, so I’m trying to be patient with the process of working back towards strict pull-ups, that’s something that’s important to me. 

Unexpected lessons from the process?
I would say hindsight is always 20/20, and so if I had to do it again I would have tapered down sooner in the last few weeks of my pregnancy. I went into it with the mindset that I was training for labour, and I have since realized that there is kind of no such thing. I think of it now more as training for post-partum. When it comes to labour there’s so many unknowns and you really just don’t know what’s going to happen and I think we put a lot of pressure on ourselves in that space. So I would have slowed down closer to the 36, 37 week mark instead of waiting until 38, 39 weeks. I was still doing pretty intense workouts, and I would have just focused more on mobility and getting out for more walks, just gentle movements.

If I’m really honest with myself, it felt good to be the pregnant girl in the gym, pushing really hard at the stage of 38 weeks. I wouldn’t say that I overdid it in the sense that there were no injuries, I was very lucky in that way, and I did recover very well but still I think taking that piece out of it and allowing for time to relax could have been very beneficial near the end. 

Three words to describe how you feel about your body at this point in time?
Work in progress. 

I’ll say the post-partum journey as far as body image goes has been wayyyy more difficult than I ever imagined, and way more difficult than during pregnancy. I thought that I would respond a little bit more to my body changes during pregnancy and maybe be a little startled by them, but I actually really loved growing and getting bigger every week, it felt very empowering. 

Then once he was born, the first couple months were no problem, I wouldn’t think too much about it. It was when I started to get close to that 3-month mark that the comparison brain started getting louder. I found myself forming comparisons to where I used to be or where somebody else in a similar stage post-partum was at, and that was fairly difficult for me at the time. 

Now I’ve been able to focus more intentionally on the things that will get me the results I’m after, like consistency. I’ve been working on being consistent with both training and recovery, and really consistent with my fuelling and now I’m starting to feel a little bit more like myself. I’d say I’m not exactly where I want to be but I’m a lot closer and I’m happy in the body I’m in with where it is right now. 

One thing that has been critical to your success returning to fitness with a young baby?
Having a partner who cares about health and fitness as much as I do. Frank is somebody who understands the importance of moving and who has seen my mental health when I’m consistent with my fitness and when I’m not, just recognizing that stress is decreased and feeling like a happier person when I exercise. Having that support is super helpful, especially being here just the two of us with family quite far away. 

Anything else to add?
Everybody says this, and it’s easier said than done but I do really think it’s important to remind yourself when you’re in this place that it’s just another phase of life. It ebbs and flows and some days you’re going to feel great about yourself and some days you’re going to feel all the other things and that’s okay. Being patient and trying your absolute best not to compare yourself to somebody else, or to yourself at another stage in your life.