“The human race would end if you were in charge of PR for pregnancy”: A firsthand account from a pregnant athlete.

Images: 2% of pregnancy (Sam Schonewille), 98% of pregnancy

March 2026

Background

My intention in writing this post is to share information that could help other pregnant athletes. It’s difficult to find good information about this experience and I benefitted greatly from anecdotes and conversations with other pregnant and postpartum athletes. Please reach out if you’d like to chat, I learned many hard-earned lessons during pregnancy and am more than happy to pass knowledge along. Keep in mind that every pregnancy is different, so what worked for me might not work for you, and if you’re pregnant or would like to become pregnant, I sincerely hope that your pregnancy feels better than mine did.

My pregnancy

My pregnancy was low-risk but miserable. I had morning sickness (aka: pregnancy sickness, which is not limited to mornings) until week 39 (I delivered at week 4o+4 days). I was too hot for my entire pregnancy (the kind of too hot that led me to hike the Chief in a sports bra in the November rain many times). I had strong food aversions to butter, cookies, and some days, everything (the exception was always Vietnamese food, shoutout to Ahn Noodle Fusion). I had soul crushing fatigue 70-80% of the time, and a generally bad attitude 90% of the time. I had cramps for the entire first trimester, and then Braxton Hicks starting in the second trimester. In the third trimester, I had restless leg syndrome and insomnia. The baby ‘dropped’ (meaning her head descended into my pelvis, which is as uncomfortable as it sounds) and I had pre-labour contractions for 5-6 weeks before I actually went into labour, which resulted in a lot of sleepless nights.

Will running make the baby fall out?

I fucking wish. I would have hauled my whale body off the couch every day to run starting at week 37 if running could make the baby fall out. Alas, I was forced to wait it out in my bloated, leaky, insomnia-riddled body until the mysterious magic of labour took hold. Complaints aside, some people have asked me whether it’s safe to exercise while pregnant. The better question is whether it is safe not to exercise while pregnant, and the answer for most pregnancies is no. Guidelines indicate that pregnant people should exercise. Physical, mental, and emotional outcomes for the pregnant person and the fetus are improved with exercise, both during and after pregnancy (of course, there are some pregnancy complications that contraindicate exercise). Even those who didn’t exercise before pregnancy are advised to begin as it reduces pregnancy-related risk.

What do the guidelines say?

There are (surprisingly) quite a few studies on the topic of exercise and pregnancy, many of which are summarized in the Canadian guideline for physical activity throughout pregnancy. Unfortunately, when it comes to guidance on what exactly to do, most research encourages an individualized approach, which leads us right back to not knowing what to do.

I dealt with this uncertainty by listening to my body as best I could. Since that’s pretty vague, I’ll try to outline how I made decisions throughout this post. I will note that guidelines explicitly advise avoiding high risk sports while pregnant, such as skiing, climbing, and mountain biking. Obviously I didn’t follow that guideline, but I did dial it down quite a bit. My ski season ended in my first trimester (more on that soon) and I was much more conservative with mountain biking and climbing.

The First Trimester: Am I gregnant?

March to June

We decided to try for a kid starting in March 2025. Our doctor said the average timeline to conceive is 6 months to a year. Being squarely in my late thirties, I was pretty sure we’d be closer to a year, so I stacked my 2025 race season accordingly. I signed up for Survival of the Fittest 18k, the Kulshan Randonee skimo race, the Coaster Marathon, Reckless Raven 50 mile, and UTMB 100 mile, but I bought insurance just in case. We found out I was pregnant on April 4, 2025 with a due date in mid-December. Julie and I skied the Spearhead traverse on April 5 and she helped me process the initial shock and excitement. After 3 more positive pregnancy tests, I finally started to accept the possibility that I was pregnant.

We went on a ski trip to the Mount Waddington area about a week after finding out I was pregnant. We made a basecamp with our friends Myrika and Vincent on the Dais glacier and spent the week skiing all around, including a failed attempt at Mt Waddington. I started to get nausea and fatigue during that trip and developed the food aversions that would haunt me for months to come (cookies, Pringles, and tragically, butter ramen). Several times I lay down in the snow while skinning and hoped the others would leave me to silently perish. They did not leave me, and luckily I still felt good for the majority of the trip.

Upon arriving home in late-April, Eric, Eric Munro (Ed.: “bad Eric”), and I decided to do our final Spearhead traverse of the season. This was, unfortunately, my breaking point for nausea. The day was overcast, sometimes whiteout, with terrible snow quality and lots of frozen avalanche debris. The combination of nausea and fatigue, compounded by bad visibility, fuelling mostly with cookies, and bumpy rubble robbed me of my will to live, and I vowed to withdraw from Kulshan Randonee and never eat cookies again. The whiteout conditions made my vertigo so bad that I feared for my life and made the Erics short rope me to the rappel station. Truly a new low. My 2024/2025 ski season ended that day.

Images: Waddington for two (Vincent Boyer), Spearhead for two (Eric Munro), and the shortrope of shame (Eric Munro)

At the end of April my doctor suggested I start taking Diclectin (doxylamine succinate/pyridoxine hydrochloride for the nerds), a combination of vitamin B and an antihistamine that can help reduce nausea for some people with few side effects. It took half a week to start working but helped bring the pregnancy sickness to a reasonable level most days (ie it stopped me from puking daily, but didn’t get rid of the nausea). I ended up taking it until week 39 of pregnancy, reducing the dosage slightly in the second trimester when I felt marginally better, and then increasing it again in the third (boo!).

Craving the sweet release of death but eating hot dogs instead

I heard about all sorts of fun cravings while pregnant like ice cream and pickles. Sadly my main pregnancy craving was to be left alone in a freezing cold room to silently perish. I did develop a taste for Maurten gels (in normal life I find the flavour to be fine, but while pregnant the flavour became irresistible). I also woke up one night with an intense craving for a smokie from the old hot dog stand at the Biltmore (anyone?). We found some all beef hot dogs and I ate them for many dinners while silently crying tears of joy (this is unfortunately true). I was obsessed with fruit in the first trimester and once single-handedly housed an entire box of 15 mangos (not in one sitting, but over a few days) that Kalie kindly dropped off for me.

Images: Two Rivers all beef hot dog (not pictured: tears of joy), Costco hot dog, and the week I loved peanut butter

I knew there was some risk associated with not gaining enough weight in pregnancy. My dietician told me that pregnant bodies prioritize the fetus and if I wasn’t eating enough, my body would draw from my bones, putting me at risk of a bone stress injury. However, eating was pretty hard in the first trimester. I gained some body fat early on thanks to the hormones and I hoped that, along with drastically reduced volume and intensity of exercise, would prevent my body from cannibalizing my skeleton. So far, so good.

One other thing to note is that my appetite dropped in pregnancy. I am used to eating a lot to keep up with my high training volume, and the extra calories needed in pregnancy (300ish per day in the second trimester, 500ish per day in the third trimester) were nothing compared to my usual calorie expenditure from exercise. Because my volume and intensity of exercise dropped so much, so did my caloric needs and appetite. I ended up gaining 20-25lbs by the end of my pregnancy which felt like the right amount for me at that time. I didn’t force myself to eat and I didn’t restrict my food, I just took it day by day and ate when I could stomach it.

Troubleshooting loosey-goosey joints

Throughout May I tried to stay as active as I could but struggled with nausea and sacroilliac (SI) joint pain. Relaxin needs no introduction for people who have been pregnant. For everyone else, it’s a hormone that, among other things, helps your joints become loose and lax so that when the baby is ripe it can fall right out if you laugh too hard or sneeze (this isn’t how it works unfortunately, but a girl can dream). I found two things helped me manage my freakishly loose joints:

• The first was pelvic floor physio (Marnie Tocheniuk, Pelvic Floor Physio). There were very few things in pregnancy that were within my control, but doing my pelvic floor exercises every single day was one of them. I was diligent about this and I think it paid off. The exercises gave me added stability, seemed to reduce my SI joint pain, and (according to some research) improved my odds of an easier labour and recovery (while I wouldn’t call labour easy, my outcomes were good and my recovery has been straightforward so far).
• The second was a belly band. I used the Maternity FITsplint belly band which helped to stabilize my pelvis and reduce bounce as my belly grew. I used it throughout the second trimester and would have used it earlier if I’d had it. The belly band became less comfortable towards the third trimester so I stopped wearing it since I wasn’t running anyways (for those who are still running, I think it could help with the discomfort of belly bounce).

The 15-minute rule

I was sick most days but I found that more often than not, light exercise made me feel better. There were certainly some days when it wasn’t happening and I needed to become a couch vegetable. However, it was almost always worth trying to run, walk, hike, or bike for 15 minutes and then evaluate whether it was making me feel better or worse. If worse, go back home and become a couch vegetable. If better (and it nearly always made me feel better), continue. This was the main way I “listened to my body” to make decisions about exercise. An added benefit was that exercise also made me hungry and helped make me eat on days when eating was difficult.

Images: Sometimes I won; Sometimes the couch won (Eric Buitenhuis)

I maintained maybe 80% of my usual running volume in my first trimester. I was pretty running fit leading into my pregnancy so I coasted on that fitness for a while. Each week I became slower and by May I was usually feeling too sick to do a running workout. I spent a lot of time hiking the Chief and did one moderately hard Chief effort in May to burn off some work stress. I also started to ride my gravel and mountain bikes more which felt a lot easier than running.

Takeaways

• I found pelvic floor physio super helpful and it’s backed by research
• I liked the Maternity FITsplint belly band and would have started using it earlier
• Diclectin isn’t magic but it did stop me from puking daily 😀
• Most days I found the 15-minute rule (If 15 minutes of exercise makes you feel better, keep going! If not, call it.) got me out the door and exercise made me feel better
• I had to get a bit creative with my fuelling because of my food aversions but it worked out in the end

The Second Trimester: One good day, one great day

June to September

At the beginning of my pregnancy I was optimistic. I had seen other pregnant women compete in races while pregnant, surely I could too! Don’t things get better in the second trimester? No and nope. My nausea and fatigue faded slightly for a few weeks in my second trimester and I had one good day (Sky Pilot & Habrich) and one great day (Harvey & Brunswick, June 15, a day to remember), but overall it was not the fun and carefree second trimester I envisioned.

One highlight of my second trimester was spending quality outdoor time with other pregnant pals. We moved slowly together, stopped frequently for water and snacks, and commiserated over shared experiences. Chatting with other pregnant and postpartum people made me feel less isolated in my experiences and helped me understand what to expect. I also have many supportive non-pregnant friends who were happy to share some time in the mountains with me, even if it looked a bit different than our normal outings.

Images, clockwise from top left: Howe Sound Crest Trail (Jeff Pelletier); Opal Cone (Jackie McKinley); La Jonction (Eric Buitenhuis); Train Traverse; please just leave me here to perish on the Train Traverse (Eric Buitenhuis); The Brain off Habrich (Eric Buitenhuis).

Balancing risk while losing my balance

Throughout the summer I sought out interesting objectives that struck the right balance of technicality – a bit technical because I was too slow to really enjoy moving across non-technical terrain (see my report on the Tour du Mont Blanc for a dramatic take on hiking non-technical trails while pregnant), but not too technical because my balance and coordination were getting worse by the week (this was me dialling it down with the high risk sports). For me, some of these objectives were Sky Pilot, Habrich, Al’s Habrich loop, Brunswick & Harvey, Cypress, Howe Sound Crest Trail, Demon Peak near Watersprite, Tenquille, Train Traverse, Opal Cone and the Gargoyles, Aiguilles Crouches, Via Alpina, and Brandywine.

I also found some of the above mentioned routes to be more pregnancy friendly because they had a fair amount of access to water and snow for drinking and cooling (on the Howe Sound Crest Trail, Jeff muled some extra water for me as there’s a long section without water).

Since I was nearing maximum discomfort at all times, it was important to me to at least feel comfortable in what I was wearing. I invested in some bigger and more supportive bras (note for those of you at this stage: my bust and band measurements kept increasing throughout pregnancy and postpartum and my bust size is now a full 7 inches bigger than normal. Many of the bras I bought in pregnancy no longer fit), maternity shorts (these Amazon maternity shorts), and size L shirts.

While I had a rough second trimester, it was still the best trimester of my pregnancy and I would recommend planning trips and objectives for this time. Again, see the Tour du Mont Blanc post for more detail on trip planning for pregnancy. The key for me was to have a lot of food, water, and contingency plans. Having an easy bail out option was important both mentally and physically. I am so glad that I did big and small days in the mountains while pregnant, and I encourage anyone who is pregnant to try to do the same but approach it with an open mind. You never know when you’ll need your pals to short rope you to the rappel station on the Spearhead.

Images: Habrich (Eric Buitenhuis); Blackcomb (Brett Trainor); Le Brevent (Eric Buitenhuis); once again too warm on Tour du Mont Blanc (Eric Buitenhuis)

It’s getting hot in here

I started to feel too warm early in my first trimester. It started in the Waddington range (when I had to stop while skinning up a steep slope to remove my long johns from under my soft shells – not easy!) and lasted until the very end. Being too hot made me more nauseous, fatigued, and gave me Braxton-Hicks early in the second trimester. Some ways I managed heat:

• An ice bandana. I bought a Rabbit ice bandana at Skiuphill and used it anytime it was 20 degrees or warmer.
• Ice in general. Putting it in my soft flasks, water bottles, shirt, bra, hat, and sometimes just holding ice cubes in my hands. During one hot day, I filled ziplock bags with ice and put them in my pockets while on a Zoom meeting (pregnancy is overall an undignified experience).
• Using snow. Early in the summer, I cooled with snow on some of my long runs by putting it in my hat and shirt.
• Dressing appropriately. Never wearing a shirt, only wearing shorts. My Naked belt became too tight in my first trimester so I bought a few bras with pockets in them to store my phone, water, and snacks. My favourite is the Lululemon Swift Speed Crop Tank which has a massive pocket in the back (it runs small by the way).
• Avoiding the heat. Exercising when it’s cooler in the mornings. Using an air conditioner and fan at night. Lying in the fetal position on a cool floor while quietly crying. Even better, lying on on a glacier while quietly crying.
• Bringing my ice water-filled gigantic Yeti water bottle with me everywhere. This is especially important while exercising.

Takeaways

• I dialled down my risk exposure but kept things interesting by choosing fun but safe feeling objectives with built in contingency plans (ie rappel stations, options to shorten the route, extra water sources, etc).
• I used every heat management tool available and still felt too hot most of the time. See the above list for my best tips.
• I’m glad I made some big plans (like doing the TMB, going to Europe, doing local scrambles and runs). I’m also glad I had contingency plans so that it was easy to pivot when things started to go sideways. Part of this was doing activities with people who were cool with pivoting and moving slow.

The Third Trimester: Sitting, waiting, wishing

September to December

Overall the third trimester was a bit of a haze. I hardly slept at all because of restless legs syndrome, insomnia, and general discomfort. I slowed down in all aspects of my life from running and hiking to brain function and reaction times. I felt like my brain wasn’t working (maybe from lack of sleep?) so work became pretty tedious – being paid to use my brain but not really having access to my brain was frankly a little unsettling.

Slowest Known Times and Personal Worsts

I closely monitored the health of my pelvic floor throughout my second and third trimester, looking for any signs that I should stop running. While I never got any clear signals of pelvic floor disfunction, I decided to stop running because I was worried about the impact to my pelvic floor, I had persistent round ligament pain, I was tired all the time, and the size of my belly made running overall unpleasant. I wasn’t too sad about stopping running – I felt like it was time. My last day of running was on September 26.

I still remained active after I quit running. I spent a lot of time at the gym, the yoga studio, and on the trails walking and hiking. I kept hiking the Chief and Evac until the bitter end (week 39) and went on long walks almost daily. I found poles were super helpful for hiking starting in the second trimester but especially in the third. The belly is heavy and you may as well use your arms as well as your legs to drag it uphill.

I went to the gym 2-4 times per week (which is how much I normally go) until the end of week 38. I also kept doing yoga 2-5 times per week throughout my pregnancy both at home and in studio. Keeping my body strong and flexible helped me to adapt to the strain of my growing belly. I didn’t go to any special prenatal classes, I just adapted the things I was doing to meet my needs with the support of my coaches. I credit Squamish Barbell in general and Jesse in particular for helping me stay strong and avoid back pain.

Images: Single leg leg press at Squamish Barbell (Eric Buitenhuis); One of over 50 pregnancy Chief hikes (Eric Buitenhuis); How I always look at the top of the Chief (Sam Schonewille)

But I’m too young to be a mom

One thing I didn’t spend almost any time doing was preparing our house for the baby’s arrival. We got the basics (carseat, bassinet, diapers, burp cloths, Ergobaby Omni 360 carrier, and a few clothes) in the weeks leading up to my due date but didn’t make a nursery (she still doesn’t have a nursery, actually) or get all the baby gear. If this speaks to you, I encourage you to not worry too much about preparing. Get the basics and get the rest on Facebook marketplace, Amazon, or from friends as you need it. We found that we didn’t quite know what we needed until we were in it. Did we feel a little guilty for Priming so much stuff to our house? Yes, but as our midwife said, it takes a village to raise a baby and Jeff Bezos is part of that village. I am glad I spent my time getting outside, reading, and being alone rather than prepping for the baby.

Pregnancy is a great time to double down on any mindfulness practices you may have. I did a lot more yoga, meditation, and breathwork and I believe it helped me a lot in my third trimester, during labour, and postpartum.

I will only say a few things about labour and delivery:

• Labour is tiring and I found it helpful to fuel like I was racing. Unfortunately I ended up fuelling like I was at mile 90 of a 100 mile race. If you’ve paced someone at the end of a long race, you’re likely familiar with the kind of nutrition negotiation that takes place. The runner becomes a picky toddler who refuses to eat and the pacer resorts to bribes and threats to ensure that the runner doesn’t keel over from hunger or dehydration. Eric did successfully get me to eat Skratch raspberry chews, Precision carb chews, a Maurten gel or two, and several bottles of Precision carb & electrolyte mix. I also ate some peanut butter pretzels in the middle of the night before active labour began.
• I tried to conserve my energy before labour. This only kind of worked because I wasn’t really sleeping (I went into labour on Wednesday morning and had slept a total of 2 hours in the 48 hours before), but looking back I’m glad I hadn’t also stacked the fatigue of a Chief hike or something similar in the days before labour.

Images: Lots of hospital check ups the week of my due date; Walking while in early labour; Snacking on PB pretzels in bed at 2am just before active labour started.

Takeaways

• I stopped running when it became super uncomfortable and no longer fun. It was a little sad and I was a little bit worried about taking so much time off, but I think it was worth it.
• Continuing to hike helped with my mental and physical health until really late in pregnancy. Added bonus of carrying an increasingly heavy load uphill was that my legs were still pretty strong towards the end. I recommend using hiking poles while pregnant.
• Going to the gym and doing yoga prevented and treated my pregnancy-related pain and made me feel just a little bit like my usual self.
• Walks: they’re kind of boring, but better than nothing towards the end
• I hardly slept in the third trimester, and I think this is a common experience. The good news is that I slept quite well within a few days of the baby arriving, despite frequent wake ups.

Looking Back

Images: Claire and I in our second trimester, Alicia in her 4th; Pregnant shuffle out to Opal Cone with Jackie; Alex & I doing 3-2-1 for probably the 3rd time that week.

As we have established, I did not enjoy pregnancy. The good news is that I am loving parenthood. It has been an exceptionally joyful and fulfilling experience so far. I started to feel better immediately after giving birth and have been on a steady upward trajectory ever since. More to come in a future post about postpartum recovery, but for me, the ‘fourth trimester’ has been by far the best.

A quick summary on how I “listened to my body” to personalize my own pregnant athlete journey:

1. The 15-minute rule: Give it a shot for 15 minutes and call it if you feel like crap.
2. Contingency plans: Plan fun things but also plan easy escape routes just in case.
3. Watch for red flags: New or unusual pain, back pain, leaking (from anywhere except maybe your eyes), pelvic floor heaviness, RED-S symptoms.

This post was long as hell, but if you’ve made it this far, I’ll summarize my main takeaways from pregnancy for you:

• I was lucky to be able to stay active throughout my entire pregnancy. It made me feel better and I think it made my labour, delivery, and recovery easier and smoother.
• Maintaining strength by going to the gym frequently helped a lot with back pain and general discomfort. I think it also helped me in the pushing stage of labour.
• I worried a bit throughout pregnancy that I would lose all of my fitness and struggle to get back to sport. I’m certainly less fit than normal right now but it isn’t nearly as bad as I worried.
• I’m happy I still made ambitious plans, travelled, and got out there during pregnancy. It was (mostly) enjoyable at the time and it’s fun to look back on all of the places I took my baby before she was born.
• It was all worth it.

Images: Worth it for the smiles (Eric Buitenhuis); Family ski days (Eric Buitenhuis); Lifting stuff with the babies (Sabrina)

Timeline of Milestones & Activities

• April 4 (4 weeks): Positive pregnancy test
• April 21 (6 weeks): Last ski day (but this is pretty close to end of ski season anyways)
• June 7 (13 weeks): Start of second trimester
• June 15 (14 weeks): The one day I felt great
• August 14 (23 weeks): Last mountain bike ride
• Sept 1 – 7 (25 weeks): Fastpacking the TMB
• September 13 (27 weeks): Start of third trimester
• September 26 (29 weeks): Last run
• October 30 (33 weeks): Chief round trip approx 1h40 (twice as long as normal)
• December 4 (38 weeks): Last time at the gym
• December 6 (39 weeks): Last Chief hike
• December 13: Due date
• December 17: Baby’s birthday