Hola! While I'm away, I am soooo stoked to have Emily from The Mom Grind share about getting your body back postpartum! This is something I plan on doing once I get back from Mexico!! Thank you so much Emily for sharing!

Hi I’m Emily from @themomgrind, and I’m so excited to be guest posting here for Laura’s blog! I’ve read her blog for a while now, and couldn’t be more thrilled to be talking about one of my favourite subjects- getting your body back after having a baby!

I’m excited to share with you all of my tips & tricks that helped me achieve and maintain a healthy relationship with food & exercise. I’m going to give you the literal guide book for how to lose that baby weight (healthily) while still finding balance in your life as a Mama.

CHECK OUT PART ONE (THE MEAL PLAN) HERE!

Working Out

This is where I’m also going to ask you to change your mindset, this time about exercise. Working out is meant to be hard, the reason we get stronger and leaner is because we’re putting our muscles under stress- making them rip and tear to form bigger ones, challenging our bodies to keep up to what we’re demanding from them.

Once I accepted that I was going to be uncomfortable in a workout- I kind of enjoyed it. I even noticed that my mindset changed in other situations of my life to being able to handle hard and stressful things outside of working out. So when you exercise, choose to make it a challenge (don’t hurt yourself, or puke) but make it difficult. How I know it’s a tough workout for example: when I get halfway or 3/4 of the way and my mind is telling me to shave down the number of reps, fudge the amount of reps I’ve actually done, or tell myself “ah, that’s good enough”. This is where the magic happens, where you prove to yourself how badass you are & this is where you will see results from- so push through to the end!

**unless you’re in actual physical pain, don’t do that! Know when it’s injury pain vs. tough mentally.**

Another thing I’ve noticed that as a Mom there’s no way to measure your success- so I take weekly pictures, weekly fitness tests, I see results (not always huge) but it’s nice to see my efforts rewarded. So remember to measure yourself in either capacity so you can see progress that isn’t a number on a scale.

I’ve gone ahead and actually given you two workouts to do at home below. However, I’m going to challenge you to find an activity, class, or workout that you love! Carve that time out of your schedule, get a sitter, coordinate daycare, get hubby to do kid duty. You time is incredibly important, and if you’re wanting to see results from working out you’re going to need to commit to a minimum of 2-3 times a week of working up a really, really good sweat!

The Workouts

W/O 1 - Test Yourself
AMRAP 10 minutes
10 burpees
10 incline push ups (off couch or coffee table)
20 Jumping jacks
20 Russian twists

Count how many rounds + reps you can complete in ten minutes.

W/O 2 - Booty Burner

4 Rounds
20 good mornings
20 squats
20 glute bridges
20 step ups onto chair or sturdy coffee table

These workouts are ones you can re-do to see improvement.

Putting it all Together

Meal Plan: Do this for at least 2 months, you will start to notice a big difference! Even better if you can do 3 or 4- but make it realistic for your life! I don’t meal plan so much anymore but I eat a diet that’s 80/20. When it starts to fall out of whack, I kickstart it with a strict meal prep cycle again!

Workout: find something you enjoy, commit to it. Make it your passion, your hobby, be consistent with it and most of all let it challenge you. Commit to doing this activity 2-3 a week!

Most importantly: find balance in your nutrition & exercise. It has to be realistic for your life- this is why so many New Years resolutions fail. They just aren’t maintainable year round, especially for us Mamas who have a pretty demanding lifestyle.

If you have any questions I’d love to answer them! Feel free to check out my Instagram @themomgrind for workout inspiration & Mom life!

Wishing you a successful, nutritious, and rewarding journey of weight loss.

You got this!

Emily