What do pregnancy, the Tour de France and the Comrades Marathon all have in common?
They all push participants to similar levels of human endurance!
Only, pregnancy is actually in a class of its own.
Published in the June, 2019 edition of Science Advances, researchers found that pregnancy is the longest duration, highest energy expenditure thing that humans can do. Finish and klaar.
Mothers are unlikely to be surprised by this, but it is incredibly liberating to have science validate my all-consuming fatigue.
While this has been my fittest pregnancy to date, now that I am approaching the finish line (four weeks to go!), its taking all my willpower to keep my head in the game.
Comrades runners often say similar things about the last 30km, and boy do I feel their pain.
I need to give myself a pep talk just to get up in the morning.
But let me return to the research briefly because I am sure there are many of you (like my husband) who remain incredulous.
The report analysed elite athletes from some of the most demanding races in the world. Researchers studied basal metabolic rates, or how many calories you need to function when your body is at rest.
The most anyone can sustain, according to the study, is burning calories at 2.5 times the person’s BMR, or about 4 000 calories a day for the average adult.
Pregnant women operate at 2.2 times their BMR – almost the maximum possible, every day, for some 270 days.
Any higher and pregnancy would be seriously dangerous.
The next time someone tells me they have run the Comrades, I’m going to boast that I have grown three babies!
I imagine this could also be why pregnant women are so nauseous.
While this is not every woman’s curse (like those annoying friends who “just love pregnancy” and appear to always be glowing), a significant portion of my first six months were spent with my head in the toilet.
One of the highlights of this time was losing my dinner outside Everest (aka Shiptech) and having to ask the kindly shop manager to hose down the forecourt.
I did however, through trial and error, discover that there exists a miracle drink on ordinary supermarket shelves.
If (when moments from emptying your stomach) you manage to glug down a few mouthfuls of Coca -Cola, most public humiliations of this sort can be avoided.
Certainly, as a child I remember flat Coke being a common home cure for upset stomachs, but this was a game changer for me. It did not take away the nausea, but I could at least hold down my dinner.
Cold also exacerbates nausea.
One of the worst places to visit while pregnant is the cold food section of the grocery store. Woolworths is the absolute worst because their cold-chain process is so good that the entire store feels like a deep freeze.
During those early pregnancy months I developed a phobia for having to go near the place unless I had remembered my winter jacket (in the middle of February nogal).
Once – before my pregnancy was public knowledge – while I was traversing the aisles, I unknowingly passed an old friend.
She later texted me, very concerned. Was I okay, she asked, confessing that she had seen me in Checkers, but I had looked so miserable that she thought it wise to give me some space.
I was probably concentrating hard on not being sick into my trolly.
Still, having children is honestly the best thing that Piet and I have ever done.
One particular occasion in the past week comes to mind.
Our eldest Daniel (7) had been struggling to fall asleep. He came out of his room and asked if he could pray for ‘Baby Sister’ and proceeded to lay his hand on my belly and pray the sincerest and sweetest request for his sister’s protection.
I was floored.
Children will never cease to amaze you.
***
I hope all our reader’s enjoyed our April Fool’s joke two editions back.
There were certainly more than a few locals who were taken-in.
Mind you, just the other day a resident asked me whether the nudist beach at Thompson’s Bay was still on the cards.
That gave me a good chuckle as that was our April Fool’s joke last year.
So, you can breathe a sigh of relief.
There is no ferry planned to replace the Tongaat bridge. Although, perhaps a ferry would be faster!
Waiting for the bridge to be repaired appears to be the biggest joke of all.
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