"So How Are You Feeling?"

Here's a question I've been getting a lot... "How're you feeling??"

Overall, I'd say I'm feeling pretty good. I have several normal pregnancy symptoms but they've been pretty mild so far (knock on wood). I tend to feel nauseous in the mornings, especially when my stomach is empty and I drink water. Eating a bowl of cereal has been helping. I feel the bouts of nausea usually throughout the morning but do what I can to just ignore it. I am still doing some sort of workout every morning and for the most part, once I get going, the nausea dissipates.

My blood pressure must be on the low side right now too because I get dizzy a lot if I stand up too quickly. I'd forgotten about this but Scott reminded me that I went through the same thing with Moana. So it's not too bothersome, but I do have to usually stop and grab onto something when I stand up until the dizziness goes away.

Finally, first trimester tired-ness is the real deal. Every afternoon I've been getting really tired and have fallen right asleep on the couch while Moana takes her afternoon nap. Seriously, it's worse than Ironman-Training-Tired. Yesterday I was reminiscing about how I used to have so much energy that I would just clean clean clean the whole house from top to bottom. Can't even imagine that right now. This is the messiest my house has ever been and I don't even care. BUT I have been getting in my daily swims/runs (there's a reason why I do them in the mornings). Mama's got her priorities straight. ;)

As far as my working out goes, it's been just fine. I've slowed down some of course, though I'm not sure how much of that is mental vs physical. I know some of it is physical, but I do think that most of the slowing down right now stems from me just on purpose not being willing to push myself. So I still swim the same amount as I normally would, but my base pace has slowed about 5 sec/100 and I don't push it. Remember those extra gears I used to talk about? Yeah, they're in storage. I have one steady state pace right now and hopefully I'll keep it right there until July. We did our Saturday morning ocean swim again this morning and I hung right in there with the group and didn't feel like I overdid it at all. One major difference between regular working out and pregnancy working out (for me) that I've noticed is that I have to bring GU all the time with me because I just never know when my blood sugar is going to drop. Normally I could get through a 90 minute swim no problem and wouldn't even think about needing carbs, but when I'm pregnant it seems like about 100 calories of sugar/carbs every 45 minutes or so is necessary so I don't start shaking. I brought a GU with me into the ocean this morning and took it mid-way through the swim and then had a Clif bar right as we finished and blood sugar was fine.

But then I went for a run (fun! In the rain!)... I actually did fine through the run. Easy pregnant pace is still 9 minute miles right now which I was pleasantly surprised about (I'm sure that will slow substantially in the coming months). Anyway, almost immediately upon finishing I had this serious craving for Coke. Real Coke. I think the only time in the last decade I've had real Coke was in Kona during the marathon- I mean, I NEVER stop in to a gas station to buy it or anything. Well, I didn't before today anyway. Driving home I stopped at the first gas station I could find and bought 20 oz of cold Coke and slammed it down like a college student slams a beer. Ahhhhhhhh. BURP. Ahhhhhhhhh. Boy there's nothing like a Coke when you're body is craving sugar!

So there you go. For the most part, I'm feeling fine. Still working out a good bit. I think I got in about 12K swimming, 19 miles running, and 25 miles biking this week (all easy), along with 2x gym lifting sessions. Not sure what I'm going to do tomorrow. If it's nice I'll go ride my bike, but if the rain doesn't stop then I'll run again. That's the nice thing about exercising vs training- you can change your plan based on the weather because in the end, it won't matter a bit of I ride or run tomorrow. I'm just a mama trying to keep her sanity, and either one will do the trick for me right now.