6 Weeks Postpartum

I am now 6 weeks postpartum and I'm happy with the way things are coming along but I'm still not comfortable wearing form fitting tops. My stomach went down really fast in the beginning and while it is a little smaller than my 2.5 week postpartum update here, progress has slowed down as expected. I think it's really close to the point where it's gone down just about as far as it can on it's own and now it's time to start exercising.

 

I still have loose skin around my belly button and I get self conscious around H when I pull up my top to breastfeed and I've got this roll sitting on top of my pants. It takes about 6 months after pregnancy for everything to come back into place and exercise will tighten the skin, so I try to remember that. I've been waiting for the 6 week mark to start exercising. I haven't done any at all--and really I'm not in a rush. I know I'm lucky to have fast metabolism, but as I mentioned before, you can actually hinder your progress of getting back to pre-pregnancy size if you start too soon. I actually plan on waiting till the weekend to start walking and I will start incorporating other exercises next week. I plan on waiting at least two more weeks if not longer for ab work.

 

My stomach got so stretched out last year and this year so I really want to give my stomach muscles a chance to come back together and not aggravate the process by doing standard situps. I have to build up my core first.

 

Here is the progression thus far:

 

 

As far as other postpartum issue besides getting back into shape, I'm happy to report that I haven't had any baby blues. I still get some random sciatic nerve pain in one of my legs here and there, and my neck and shoulders hurt related to breastfeeding from last year (that's another post), but that's pretty much all I can think of. Later this afternoon I have my 6 week postpartum appointment where the nurse will check and make sure my uterus is back to it's normal size and we'll be discussing birth control...because this baby making factory is closing up shop! I'm not ready to do anything permenant in case I ever change my mind, but I really don't see that happening. I've got more than I can handle and I feel like my family is complete with three girls.