Swimming with the Baby

Last week I started swimming every other day as a way to relieve the strain of carrying all of the extra weight I have been building up. It has been great. I swim for about 40 minutes per visit, and continue to feel really great, even hours after the swim. I have never liked swimming so much as I do now. A woman I met at the pool says that the water pressure is great for swelling too. I didn't know that, but given how much better I have been feeling afterward, I'm not surprised.

In order to start swimming I had to buy my first pregger swim suit (ugh). Here is a picture. Again, this is not me in the picture - it's a model for Target, where I bought the scary thing. (I'm actually much bigger in the tummy now than the woman in this pic.)

Also, I decided to join the YMCA. I decided to go with them after first making a visit to Bally's, which had a "special deal" going on. Turns out their deal was not so special, once you added in all the long-term obligations and restrictions. I next visited the Y after that and was so pleasantly surprised. The Y has a financial assistance program for low-income applicants like myself, which makes the pricing much more reasonable. Also the YMCA that I will be joining in West LA has FREE child care (at least 1 hour per day for kids aged 6 weeks to 1 year, and then 2 hours per day for kids up to age 10!), free group exercising classes (including yoga), and free Mommy and me swimming - among so many other things. I've been very eager to sign VJ up for swim lessons once he's born, so I am very happy about all the Y's programs for kids and families.

Until then (when the little guys is swimming in pools rather than Mommy's amniotic fluid), I'll just keep enjoying the Y on my own. (They also have better parking than most clubs around LA too).