My Heart Is Sayin’ Let’s Go, But My Body’s Sayin’ No (No)
Where my 90s-00s girls at?! ;) This little spin on some classic Christina has been running through my brain lately.
I feel at my best when I’m physically active. When I take the time to get my heart pumping on a regular basis I feel happier, less stressed, accomplished, and strong.
It’s not always easy to fit into my schedule, and I don’t always want to. If I waited to be “in the mood,” it would never happen. I do my best to sign up for that class anyway, lace up my tennis shoes anyway, sweat it out anyway. And I’m always glad I got it done because it makes me feel good.
But sometimes life circumstances swoop in and change the game.
I feel naive for saying it, but I didn’t expect IVF to be so hard on my body. I talked with my doctor. I researched a lot. I scrolled Instagram reading other women’s stories and experiences, but you just can’t know what it’s like until you are living it. I was unprepared. While I was injecting the hormones, I felt mostly okay. A little emotional toward the end, but I felt good overall. The hardest part for me wasn’t the shots, it was everything after my egg retrieval. The surgery was particularly tough on me. There weren’t complications per se, but I was the patient that day with extra bleeding, monitoring, a dose of fentanyl, and an extended time in the recovery room. (Not to mention 5 tries to find a vein for my IV.) After a few days of rest, I felt much better… and then the dreaded post retrieval period hit. Ten times more estrogen than normal circulating in my system meant trying to make it through work with a heating pad strapped around my mid section and going home an hour in because I couldn’t stand anymore. The worst. And finally there was the hormone withdrawal which has seemed to last a month with varying symptoms like fatigue, headaches, night sweats, body aches, food aversion, nausea, enhanced sense of smell… ya know, the things that might lead other people to believe you are pregnant. Except you are very not. You’re just dealing with all the same elevated hormones that tend to cause those things in pregnant women. Honestly, I’ve been fairly miserable. My body has felt so foreign and uncomfortable that “getting back to normal” has been challenging. Sprinkle on some shame for feeling like I was failing… my body did not produce what we needed to have a baby despite serious medical intervention and I was feeling physically weaker by the day. I don’t think those two things are mutually exclusive.
While I’m still processing our IVF results and releasing the shame and sadness I’ve felt over it, I finally hit the point where I can’t keep still anymore. My body needs to move… it doesn’t want to. But to alleviate stress, to feel better - it needs to. I’ve been so scared of this step. Up until this week, I have only been able to handle some low intensity work outs and yoga. What would it feel like to push myself? Have I lost all my strength and endurance in the last month and a half? The thought of being back at square one was intimidating and actually infuriating, but I knew I had to start somewhere.
I decided to start at home with a shorter high intensity work out just to see how it would feel. Well, it felt terrible, y’all. I hit the pause button about halfway through because I just couldn’t hold back the tears anymore. It was so dang hard. And I was frustrated that this workout that I had done with ease many times before was now difficult enough to bring me to tears. It sucked. But after a word of encouragement from my sweet husband and a few deep breaths, I hit play. I tried again. I picked myself back up and imperfectly finished. It was still hard, but I made it to the end. And I was incredibly proud of myself for not giving up. And then for signing up for a class back at my studio (shout out to OrangeTheory Fitness Burbank for being SO supportive during this time). For showing up, doing my best, and not beating myself up because my best today looks different than it might have in the past. One step at a time.
Sometimes we find ourselves in an unexpected place and we have to start over. It might be uncomfortable, frustrating, painful… but we’ll never get to move forward if we don’t try again. There is a time to be gentle with yourself and a time to test your limits. You know which time it is for you. When you’re ready, dust yourself off. Give it another go. Then keep going! I really believe you’ll be so glad you did. I know I am.
