How to Recover from a Marathon

Well done on completing your marathon! Now comes the hard part… Recovering from a marathon can take days if you don’t do it properly – after my first, I had to wear slip on shoes until Wednesday because I couldn’t bend down to tie my laces… By my second, I’d learned a few lessons and…

Why we loved our Shared Parental Leave

Here in the UK, parents can share up to 52 weeks of leave around the birth or adoption of a child. This maternity and/or paternity leave can be taken at the same time, or one after the other. It’s still pretty unusual for parents to share the leave – the assumption is that dads or…

Surviving and Thriving in the Fourth Trimester

We’ve kept a baby alive for three months! And actually had a really lovely time while doing it. While pregnancy is split into three trimesters of three months each, some baby experts also define the first three months of a baby’s life as the fourth trimester. It’s a period of massive change for your baby,…

Post-Pregnancy Marathon Plans

Race entry deadlines force you to make decisions months ahead of your intended races. So, just three months after having Stanley I’m starting to think about post-partum marathon plans. I started doing gentle exercise at six weeks post-partum, and began running again this week, ten weeks after Stanley’s birth. I had thought I might want to…

Returning to Running and Exercise after Pregnancy

Before starting back running after baby Stanley’s birth, I went to see Rob White at Challenge Physio to get the all clear for starting to train again. I’ve really missed running since I gave it up at 7 months pregnant, and I wanted to make sure that I remain injury free once I do start up again. I…

Postnatal Running with Nike Epic React

While this was a sponsored opportunity from Nike, all content and opinions expressed here are my own. I’m just getting back on track – or finding a whole new one – after the birth of baby Stanley Atticus five weeks ago. Labour went according to plan – home birth in the pool in my dining…

Leeds Abbey Dash 10k – 31 Weeks Pregnant

“When will you stop running?” was a question I was asked a lot when I was first pregnant, and I didn’t have an answer. I knew I would run as long as I felt comfortable, and safe. So, I didn’t know that the Abbey Dash would be my last pregnant race at the time I…

Enjoying my Second Trimester

A friend described the three trimesters in order as ‘dreary, cheery and weary’, and I certainly found the middle one a lot happier than the first (though I’m still feeling great in the third too). Now that I’m most definitely into my third and final stretch, I thought I’d give a little round up of…

Women’s Running 10K Race Report – 6 Months Pregnant

“It’s going to be super muddy tomorrow – you do have trail shoes, don’t you?” said Mum, the night before our Women’s Running 10K race, a trail race that we’ve have been ambassadors for for about six months. Hmm. Well, yes, I did HAVE them, in the sense that I own trail shoes. Several pairs…

Can being pregnant make you run faster?

All of a sudden, as I began my second trimester of pregnancy, my running started to get much faster and feel easier than it had for years. The advice, quite rightly, is to not focus on PBs while pregnant, and just enjoy being active for as long as you can. But I’ve suddenly found myself…

Surviving my First Trimester

My first trimester lasted about a year. The calendar said it was 13 weeks, but my body felt each week like a season. I was super thrilled to be pregnant, and cautiously excited about the baby, but massively thrown off my equilibrium and days seemed to stretch into weeks. A lot was to do with…

Marathon Running Baby on the Way!

It was at about mile 17 of London Marathon that it dawned on me that I was possibly pregnant. Everything was fine, my energy levels were good and my legs felt strong, but one thing felt off – my energy blocks just didn’t taste right. Every time I tried to swallow one, they smelled different…