So. This is me starting over. WAAAAAAY over. You’ve probably notice that I haven’t been around much…like AT.ALL. I have good reason for that. On top of being pregnant, moving cross-country (AGAIN), and having to completely pack/unpack my entire house while 8 months pregnant, Smalls was diagnosed with a very rare disease: Severe Aplastic Anemia.

You can read more about what that means for my family HERE.

Needless to say, I’m exhausted. AND I now have a 6 week old, which means that I can start exercising again. Oh, joy.

This wouldn’t be such a huge deal…but I gained a LOT of weight. Y’all, I’m over 200 pounds. I wasn’t even that when I DELIVERED Smalls. So I have a long ways to go. 75 pounds, in fact. Do you want to take this journey with me?

I’ve Got My New Shoes On

running shoes One of the fun things about pregnancy is that my feet GROW…I’ve grown a full shoe size between having both boys!

Which means that I now have a closet FULL of shoes that don’t fit (we’re not even going to talk about the clothes.). So I did what any rational person would do: I sent the good ones off to ThredUp so I could get paid for them.

A girl’s gotta fund her new running shoes, right??

I LOVE ThredUp. I was able to send in all of my maternity clothes (because who wants to grow another shoe size?!), and with all of Smalls’ medical bills, I can’t really afford to spend a ton on a new pair of shoes.

Color me excited when I got over $300 for the clothes I was never going to wear again and shoes that no longer fit!! I was over the moon. So I was able to buy a pair of Pearl Izumi’s from Zulily AND have some funds left over (at least until the medical bills come)!

Working It Out

I’m using The Dia Method: 10 Minutes Flat Post-pregnancy Fitness System.

It’s a nice, gentle way to help ease my body back into exercise. I used the pregnancy workout and LOVED it, but still managed to gain a bit too much.

Now that I’m past my 6 week window (I had a repeat cesarian), I can start using some of the extra workouts that come with their system, as well as a few others in my arsenal.

Now, remember that I’m working everything around twice-weekly visits to the Children’s Hospital for Smalls’ platelet and hemoglobin infusions…it’s a bit crazy around my house most of the time.

So I’ve been struggling to find a balance-it’s exhausting, between the long days (if he needs both hemoglobin and platelets our days are 8-10 hours long), and the lack of sleep from the newbie (help me think of a cute bloggy name for him!!), I struggle to get everything done. And a solidly healthy diet?

FORGET IT. I do strive to take my vitamins every day, but there are a LOT of fresh foods that Smalls cannot eat, so that limits what I feel comfortable having in the house with a 4-year-old who helps himself. So, my goal this month is to get that back on track as well…that’s not too much, right?