Trail Notes | Movement & Motherhood

the comeback no one adequately prepares you for

Running After

Having Children.

Most of the advice about returning to running after having children focuses on the physical. Pelvic floor. Core activation. Load progression. Weeks since delivery. Clearance from the GP. That information matters. But it is only part of the story.

The other part, the one that is rarely talked about, is what happens in the body and the mind of a woman who used to know herself as a runner, and is now learning who that is inside a life that has fundamentally changed.

Trail Note  ·  01

What is actually different about your body now

Pregnancy and birth change the body in ways that go beyond the obvious. Relaxin, the hormone responsible for softening ligaments during pregnancy, can remain elevated during breastfeeding, which affects joint stability. The pelvic floor has absorbed significant load and needs graduated reintroduction to impact activity. The core has been stretched and the relationship between the deep abdominals and the breath has shifted.

None of this is permanent damage. But it does mean the return to running requires more patience and more attention than most women expect, and more than most generic return-to-run timelines account for.

The 6-week clearance from a postnatal check is not a clearance to return to high-impact running. It is a clearance from a medical standpoint. Those are different things. Most physiotherapists who work with postnatal athletes recommend a graduated return beginning with walking, progressing to low-impact activity, before introducing running, usually from 12 weeks onwards, and with individual variation.

Trail Note  ·  02

The identity piece no one talks about

Running often carries identity. For many women, it is one of the few things that belongs entirely to them: not to a role, not to a relationship, not to a responsibility. And in the early months of motherhood, it is one of the first things to go.

The loss of that can feel disproportionately large. The grief of not being able to run the way you used to, or at all, can sit uncomfortably next to the other things you are supposed to be feeling. It can feel selfish. It can feel like the wrong thing to be sad about.

It is not. It is a real loss, and it is worth naming it as such before trying to move through it.

Trail Note  ·  03

What the comeback actually looks like

It is slower than you expect. That is the most consistent thing women tell us. Not slower than the guidelines suggest. Slower than their internal expectation, which was set before they understood what the body had been through.

It also looks different than it did before. Training around sleep deprivation requires a different approach to effort. Training around feeding schedules requires flexibility in timing. Training around the emotional labour of early parenthood requires a level of self-compassion that most training plans do not account for.

The comeback that sticks is usually not the fastest one. It is the one that is honest about what this season of life actually allows, and finds a way to move consistently inside that reality.

Trail Note  ·  04

What Her Trails does differently for this member

Inside your membership, you will find the Returning to Run Postpartum circle. Join it. The women there are at different stages of the same journey and the conversation is honest.

The coaching inside Her Trails accounts for where you are in your cycle, your sleep, your load outside of training. When you reach out to Sam, tell her you are postpartum. That context changes the approach. It should, and it will.

You do not need to have your return figured out before you ask for help. You can come with questions, uncertainty, and a very imperfect schedule. That is the right starting point.

meet her gently. she is rebuilding

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