Yes, we're having a baby . . .

It's like an experiment in sociology to tell your children that you're having a baby and watch what happens. It's been a crazy week - not to mention coming home from vacation, having 2 days to recover, and then having company stay at your house for seven days, finding out you're pregnant, and really just trying to recover from a marathon emotionally and physically and wishing you can run.

So, yes - if there was any question after my last post - I am pregnant, and no, I had no idea when I ran the Boston Marathon. It's kinda funny to think about - maybe my body had it's own way of telling me to slow down. And it's kinda funny to think that I carried someone along that never qualified - oops! It's kind of a worrisome thing, too - to know that I ran that far and pushed my body to the limit while it was concentrating on other things. I've tried and tried to find research on the topic of running marathons while pregnant, but there isn't much out there but the standard - run easy while you're pregnant and don't compete. There are supposed heart rate limits (140 bmp) and supposed temperature limits (102 degrees), but there are articles that refute that, too. Perhaps when I talk with the doctor, I can find more answers.

The whole thing about telling the children . . . when you find out you're having a baby, it's a pretty exciting thing, and you want to share it with your children. It is highly unreasonable to tell a six-year-old such news, and expect her to keep it a secret. But it's also still very early in the pregnancy and there are reasons to not tell the general public. We chose to live in the moment. The kids - mostly our youngest - told the entire population in a matter of hours she was so excited. I've had very healthy pregnancies, but you can never predict such a thing - only take it one day at a time.

One day at a time? Me - who has no patience? Me, who was asking what next and planning my next marathon? Oh, my. It's so hard to take it day by day and not think too much about it all since it's so early, but it's so hard to not think about it when there is this child miraculously growing inside of me. I know that I have a scheduled 2 more weeks of no running, possibly 4, to make it either 4 or 6 weeks of no running post marathon to let my IT bands heal. And really, with no upcoming race, I have no reason to hurry it. I swam Friday, and can continue to up that training, and water running, just not with too much intensity. And I can lift weights lightly. And I read yesterday that I could bike up until 10 weeks when the uterus moves up into the abdomen. Prior to that, it is protected, and even falling off of a bike would not hurt the baby. But with IT issues, I won't be biking until after that, and then, I guess, I could ride a stationary bike. But that means a tri is out. Grrrrrr. But I've read that people do it . . . if anyone has more thoughts on that, I'd love to hear them. I did go for a 2-3 hour walk on Saturday and did lots of yardwork - my little leggies were sore after, so that was too much. Maybe I'll just walk the dog.

I'm seriously gonna go crazy. I need some focus - something to keep me occupied to take the place of training and training goals.

And all of our children were intentionally named after places - just something we chose to do. All five members of our family have the same middle initial as well - kind of a family connectedness thing. But it's so early to think of baby names . . . . and I really just want to take a nap.