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I wasn’t sure how much I wanted to write about my first trimester because it was pretty miserable.  But in reflecting back on those eventful first few months, I realized that all the hard work I had done learning to listen to my body over the past many years with my coach Barb Lindquist had become very important. 

To remind you of the timeline, I found out I was pregnant at an appointment with a fertility specialist on December 18^th.  Yay!!  A few days after I learned I was pregnant, I began to experience that wonderful hallmark of pregnancy: morning sickness.  Boo!!  Except my nausea wasn’t confined to just the mornings.  It was all day.  So, let’s just call it all day sickness, because I’m finding that among pregnant women who suffer nausea, all day sickness is a more accurate term!  Now, don’t get me wrong, I had a wonderful rotation at the University of Michigan working in the Child and Adolescent Inpatient Psychiatric Unit for 3 months, but driving an hour to Ann Arbor every morning really stirred up that all day sickness.  I would get a break from my nausea by biking 15 minutes from the hospital parking structure to the Ann Arbor YMCA and then doing whatever workout was on the schedule for that day.  Exercise was a welcome relief from my nausea!  The relief would long enough for me to get back to my car and down my protein smoothie before coming back just in time to ruin any hope of eating breakfast.  Unless it was scrambled eggs.  I ate A LOT of scrambled eggs. 

But I soon learned that pregnancy doesn’t just come with nausea.  It also brings decreased immunity.  I soon caught a cold while working on the unit that, as I was recovering, turned into a sinus infection.  When the sinus infection didn’t clear on its own after a couple of weeks, I finally broke down and went to an urgent care to get a course of antibiotics.  I was hoping that treating the sinus infection along with the combination of medications and over-the-counter remedies for my nausea would at least let me enjoy our upcoming ski trip to Utah.  Our trip was in mid-January and I was determined to have a good time!  

I want to add a little disclaimer here, because downhill skiing while pregnant is seriously not for every pregnant woman!  My OB had cleared me to continue downhill skiing for a couple of reasons.  First, I had been downhill skiing most of my life and it was very natural to me, so it wasn’t a new skill that I was trying to learn.  Second, I was still early in my pregnancy and my uterus was low and protected by my pelvis, meaning if I did fall then the baby was generally well protected.  It also would take an odd amount of skill to fall on your stomach while downhill skiing… it’s more of a fall on your side or butt thing.  But skiing while pregnant still carries risk, so I promised to be careful.  Yup.  I, Samantha Kennedy, promised to be careful.  And to my amazement and the amazement of my family, I actually was!  Most people know that when I downhill ski, I’m pretty serious.  I enjoy skiing backcountry, jumping off cliffs and exploring avalanche zones (these are areas that have been cleared by ski patrol so are at low risk of avalanches).  I’ve also been known to ski as fast as possible down a run with a GPS watch to see how high of a speed I can get.  I did none of that.  With the addition of the little human growing inside me, I realized that I was actually developing that maternal instinct I had been worried I wouldn’t develop.  I’m a bit of a dare devil and I have a reputation of throwing caution to the wind when it comes to sport.  I have raced my body to the point of ending up in the ambulance or hospital multiple times and this just seems to be part of who I am, as it has been a challenge for me to back off and slow down.  But there I was, on this beautiful mountain play land of powder and cliffs and steep descents and boulders and I was being cautious and safe.  It may sound silly, but that was a proud moment for me.  I realized that I was developing a protective instinct and I was able to put the health of another human ahead of my own desires.  It sounds small, but this was a big deal to me. 

On the way back from this successful trip, I had a feeling that my time of illness was not ending this easily.  I was finishing my course of antibiotics for my sinus infection, but there is no place like being trapped in a flying metal tube for being exposed to an illness.  The first night home I spiked a fever and the next morning I tested positive for influenza.  Ugh.  And yes, I got my flu shot.  But the combination of asthma, decreased immunity from pregnancy and recovering from a respiratory illness left me extremely vulnerable.  And of course influenza is typically worse in pregnant women, thanks again to that decreased immunity, and also worse in those with asthma.  Wonderful.  I spent the next week sleeping and taking my temperature every 15 minutes worrying that my fever would spike too high for the baby. 

I recovered from the influenza slowly but surely and on the Monday after my week of sleeping, I decided it was time to start moving again.  That first time back in the pool after two weeks was dreadful.  Not only was I still recovering my energy, but getting back into training after illness is never fun and I was also undertaking the minor task of growing a human.  I didn’t feel like a graceful swimmer moving through the water… I felt like a drowning lizard.  But I slowly kept at it.  And I listened to my body.  More than ever, I realized listening to my body was vital.  In the past when recovering from illness, it wasn’t too big of a deal if I pushed too hard in a workout, it just resulted in a bit of a setback.  Now I had to be certain of the wellbeing of the human whose little fluttering heartbeat I had heard for the first time only a few weeks before.  So I took long breaks at the end of the pool.  I walked frequently on my “runs” and I often spun in my small chain ring.  And I slept as much as possible. 

As I transitioned into my second trimester, my nausea went away and my energy began to return.  I began to feel more like myself… most of the time.  I had the energy to return to a more normal training load and typically ended my workouts with a smile.  It had taken weeks of slow and careful work to get to that point.  I had learned to diligently practice restraint and to accept what I called my “tired days.”  Those are the days when I wake up and I just feel worn out, even after a good night’s sleep.  I’ve learned there is pretty much nothing I can do to predict tired days, they just happen.  I’m assuming it’s a part of pregnancy, due to some hormone surge or growth surge on the baby’s part or something like that.  The hardest part for me has been accepting what I can do on tired days and having that be good enough.  One day I’m swimming sub 1:20 pace in the pool and feeling like Katie Ledecky and the next swim I’m barely managing 1:30 pace and feeling out of breath after 400 yards.  I had to learn to be not just okay with that, but to be happy with that.  I had to learn that I could not base the value of my workout that day on pace or watts, but on good old rate of perceived effort and the fact that I actually did my workout! 

I feel so blessed to have my coach Barb Lindquist on this journey.  Not only did she spend years patiently helping me learn to listen to my body, but she has been incredible on this training during pregnancy journey!  Early on, I would feel a little defeated about my perception of how a week of training had gone, but thankfully I had Barb to put things into perspective for me.  It helps when your coach has twin boys and can give you a loving slap of reality!  I found myself soon agreeing with her messages saying she was proud of my week or that I’m doing a great job through this pregnancy!  And slowly I’ve begun to realize she isn’t just talking about my training.  She is talking about my brain’s slow transition from selfish triathlete to mom.  And I don’t mean selfish triathlete in a bad way!  Up to this point, triathlon has been a lot about me.  My training, my races, my schedule.  Yes, obviously I make time to train and race with my hubby and friends, but I would still prioritize specific workouts above other things in life.  And that was totally okay!  That was where my life was and it was a lot of fun!!  Now I find myself thinking in terms of my baby girl and respecting the needs of my body for the health of my baby girl.  It isn’t about me anymore.  That thought was really, really scary.  It still is.  But it is also getting exciting!  It isn’t about just me or Todd and I anymore!  It is going to be about us, the Kennedy Family.  And that is definitely worth learning how to slow down, listen to my body and learning how to appreciate just being able to move and train when I can. 



Getting ready to cut into our gender reveal cake!



It's a GIRL!