Food For Thought And The Thought Of Food

Elements of ignorance are what I have in my relationship with the foods I can eat while going through my current state of breastfeeding.

Prior to having a baby or even being pregnant I had to make sure I was getting enough calories and nutrition in my body to have the energy needed for my workouts and living life how I saw fit. I would eat lots of carbs because I was burning so much calories on my runs, and I never thought twice about what I could eat. Meaning if I wanted ice cream, or maybe some gummy bears, I would have them because I knew I was doing enough exercise to burn it off. I'm not saying I ate tons of crap food, I enjoy my salads with my meals, my fish etc.

Once pregnant things changed when I found out my thyroid wasn't producing enough hormones for two. This meant I was told by the doctor to back off the carbs, starches, fruit higher in sugar like tropical fruit and eat more veggies and produce. With the support of my awesome husband we did a new grocery shop and loaded up on fruits and veggies like no other. I got back on track with my pregnancy weight gain and was feeling great...Still looking forward to my DQ once pregnancy was done but on track none the less.

Post baby and thyroid back to normal I went back to my well balanced diet. Eating plenty of spinach salad and enjoying my tea in the morning, my yogurt with marshmallows and chocolate chips in the afternoon, to later in the evening finding out I made a terrible error!! This mistake was found by a piercing cry from my newborn baby who kept me up all night, unable to express in words that her stomach/digestive system was in pain.

Goodbye spinach, goodbye caffinated tea, and goodbye chocolate chips and dairy. This is just a start of the things I have learned IYLA doesn't do well with. The majority of leafy greens are out, veggies, fruit like strawberries and pineapples, beans of any sort. I am now having to monitor my intake quite closely and test things out with the chance I might have a baby quite upset in the middle of the night. Not a risk that is very fun to take.

This might all go away as her digestive system develops but for now this is where I am at. It's bringing a whole new realm of questions to my mind for my upcoming training that starts in just over two weeks.

Typically my food is quite consistent during training mode:

• English muffin toasted with butter and peanut butter in the am before a long run
• Chocolate Raspberry GU Roctane gel that has 2x caffeine during my runs
• Chocolate Milk post run 

• Pasta Dinners with red sauce a couple days prior to long runs and/or racing 
• Spinach salad all the time
• Black bean burgers

As you can see all of the above will not and can not be part of my diet now currently, so I will need to think of modifications to make. Gels without caffeine, a different flavour than chocolate, post drink needs to be non-dairy, my breakfast needs to change the element of peanut butter.

You know what, I'm new and learning and welcome any feedback any of you moms out there have for me. I know it's not forever and it will take a bit of planning but I'm committed to the best health for myself and even more so, for IYLA.

Once training starts I will let you all know the modifications I have made and what I have found to work for both her and myself.