Bump, Bike & Baby Read online

  I bring Aran into the crèche, and undo my top. I push Aran under my sports bra that is holding my udders in place. It is a bit of a squeeze, as the bras I have to wear these days have to be super tight; if not, there could be trouble with my boobs jiggling about while I exercise. Aran is still less than eight weeks old, so a bottle is not yet an option. So I have to fill him up as much as possible, directly from the source. I don’t want him crying with hunger and bothering the crèche staff while I’m away. All he needs is ninety minutes’ worth of breast milk so that I can do my session in peace.

  I come back from my bike ride, buzzing with adrenaline.

  ‘How was he?’ I ask.

  ‘Great,’ the crèche staff tell me. Aran is bouncing about on one of their laps. I am genuinely happy to see him.

  I take him into my arms and give him a quick top-up. This training and motherhood combination might just work out all right.

  Pete sees how hard I’m working to get this combo going.

  ‘Can I get you a birthing present?’ he says. I look at him, slightly bewildered.

  ‘Aren’t husbands meant to buy their wives something,’ he asks, ‘to thank them for giving birth to their kid?’

  ‘Buy me something? Like what?’

  ‘I don’t know. Diamonds?’

  Diamonds are so not me. I don’t even wear my engagement ring, as it just tends to get in the way. No, I’ve got a way better idea.

  ‘Why don’t you buy me a set of bike rollers as a thank-you present?’

  ‘Bike what?’ Pete says. ‘What are they?’

  ‘Don’t you worry,’ I say. ‘I’ll buy them online and send you the bill.’ And so, to thank me for enduring all those months of pregnancy, my husband pays for a set of rollers that let me ride Bike inside the house. It is a genuinely romantic gesture.

  But even when the rollers arrive, Pete is still confused. ‘How exactly are you meant to use those things?’ He is examining the three long metallic cylinders that are connected together by industrial rods. He spins them around with a push of his hand. They don’t look safe at all.

  ‘Well, you put your bike on top of the rollers, then pedal your bike,’ I say, as if I know it all.

  ‘All right then,’ Pete says. ‘Show me.’

  I’ve never used rollers before but I am determined not to lose face in front of Pete. I balance my back wheel on the two rear cylinders, and my front wheel on the remaining one. Holding on to Pete’s shoulder, I hoist myself on to the saddle, and press my foot down. My bike rolls one way, I roll the other, and Pete catches me as I fall.

  ‘Think I need a little practice,’ I say, trying to hide my shame.

  I soon discover that the way to use rollers initially is to park them in a doorway. Then if you lurch to the left or right, there’s a wooden beam on either side to break your immediate fall. I spend weeks practising on my rollers. At the start, I cling for dear life to both sides of the doorway. Eventually, one hand moves to the handlebars, then the other. It takes me nearly a month to perfect the balancing act.

  In my mind, Bike and I are ploughing up highways together, careering down hills at breakneck speeds. But to all around us, I am pedalling frantically in my living room, going absolutely nowhere.

  Roller sessions are perfect for minding Aran. I put him in his chair in front of me so I can watch his every move. I put Bike on the rollers, and I spin away, doing my session without leaving my front door.

  Buoyed by the success of my indoor cycling, I try different ways to solve the ‘training with Aran’ conundrum. One day I have no crèche arranged and Pete is away for work. I have a thirty-minute run to do, so decide to hit the treadmill. I bring Aran to a local gym that I know will be quiet and welcoming. I lie Aran down inside a Moses basket, and place it right beside me. I start the treadmill and slowly quicken my stride. But Aran is unsettled.

  He might need a little drink. I stop the treadmill abruptly and pick baby Aran up. Squatting on the stationary running belt, I give him a quick feed. It seems to do the trick, and he slowly closes his eyes. But as soon as I place him back in the basket, he starts to grimace and whine.

  The sound of the treadmill. Does that lull a baby to sleep?

  I ignore the growing sounds of his cries as I increase the pace of the track. With the surge in speed, the whirring noises rise, but so do Aran’s squeals.

  There is nothing more distressing for a parent than hearing their baby endlessly scream. After less than a minute, I can’t take it any more and hit the emergency stop button. I dismount the belt and pick Aran up to calm his angry tears. But as his tears are soothed, mine begin to torrent down my cheeks out of sheer frustration. I am forced to give up on the treadmill idea for the foreseeable future.

  It’s becoming painfully obvious that, though I may have given birth to Aran, when it comes to child-rearing I know about as much as Pete.

  Finally, Aran passes the eight-week mark, and I extract my milk with glee. I hand a milk-filled bottle and the baby to Pete, and go for my scheduled hour-long run. I come back home, refreshed by my brief break. Aran is fast asleep on Pete’s shoulder. But Pete is not looking happy at all.

  ‘How did it go?’ I ask, unsure if I really want to know.

  ‘He cried for the full hour and literally just fell asleep,’ Pete says. ‘He totally refused the bottle.’

  ‘Oh no, you’re not serious.’ The happiness I felt coming in the door rapidly dissipates. ‘Did you warm the milk?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And did you try another teat?’ I heard that could make a difference.

  ‘YEEESSS,’ Pete says. I am lucky Pete is busy holding Aran, or else he would get up and throttle me.

  Before I had children, I could disappear for hours, even days on end, and run through the mountains without a care. Now even leaving the house for sixty minutes causes immense stress and upheaval. I had no idea how much I would have to sacrifice when a baby arrived on the scene. I am sure I was told, but could never fully understand, the time and effort required to look after one.

  I am so close to promising Pete that I won’t leave him alone ever again with Aran. That I’ll stop all this silly training, that I’ll make sure I’m around all the time to look after our child. It would be so easy for me to just give up right now. The problem is, I always finish what I start. It is something my parents ingrained in me from an early age. And I’ve just started this road back to fitness. If I give in now, not only will I lose all the benefits that exercise promises, but I will also consider myself an abject failure for forsaking something that is so fundamental to my identity.

  Desperate for some respite, I too try to get Aran to drink from a bottle. Pete tries. The crèche staff all try to get Aran to drink breast milk from this receptacle. In the end, all of us fail spectacularly. Aran is a breast man through and through, and he’s determined to stay that way.

  9

  Race

  ‘I want to race,’ I tell Eamonn during our weekly catch-up call. I’m sure he’ll tell me it’s far too soon. I’ve only done six weeks of proper training, and I’m struggling to get back into any sort of form.

  ‘Great idea!’ he says, making me do a double take. ‘Nothing like a goal to keep you motivated. Which one are you hoping to do?’

  I had already secretly researched some adventure races and found one in Donegal. Just like the one I did when five months pregnant, this one also takes place on the Inishowen Peninsula. The Rugged Peaks Race is a sixty-five-kilometre course across one of Ireland’s remotest parts, full of rolling hills, rugged coastline, and stunning, unspoilt scenery. And it is literally just down the road. It means I can do the race and be back home in the afternoon without upsetting too much Aran or Pete’s routine.

  Days before the event, however, I am horrified to hear it won’t go ahead due to insufficient entries. It is October, and it seems that everyone is either injured or penniless from competing in events throughout the summer. I am incredibly disappointed. Ever since I met Sus
ie, I’ve set myself the mental target of competing at the four-month post-natal mark. Susie won her Masters Track title four months after giving birth; I want to do something like that.

  I start to look around for something else that can take the place of the Rugged Peaks Race. There is barely anything left on the 2013 race calendar. After hours of clicking through websites, I happen upon the Sea to Summit adventure race. It takes place on the cusp of Ireland’s winter, slap bang in mid-November. There are two race routes, a thirty-kilometre short course called Spirit, and the fifty-six-kilometre long course, aptly named Supreme.

  The only problem is that Sea to Summit takes place in Westport, a three-and-a-half-hour drive from where we live. Aran will have to accompany me, what with his on-going refusal to be separated from my breasts for more than a couple of hours. And Pete will have to come along too, so that he can look after Aran while I’m on the course.

  It seems like a logistical nightmare. I hope we’ll be able to work it out.

  I figure that if I’m going to travel this far for a race, I might as well do the longer course. I click on the route details and take a deep breath. The race starts with a four-kilometre run out of Westport towards the quays via the town’s purpose-built greenway. From there, it is an eight-kilometre cycle along the Atlantic coastline towards the foot of Croagh Patrick Mountain. The peak is a paltry five kilometres up and down distance-wise. But the mountain’s height of seven hundred and sixty-four metres knocks the wind out of competitors’ sails. Having summited the mountain and returned to the base, the course returns racers to their bikes. It is then a thirty-five-kilometre cycle up and over the Maum hills, where gradients reach a lung-busting twenty-five degrees in parts. Fortunately, the bike section leads back to Westport, where those who are still able and willing run the last four-kilometre stretch back along the greenway and into Westport town.

  Just reading the course description leaves me exhausted.

  I click on pictures from last year’s Croagh Patrick Mountain ascent. I see skinny men dressed in tight triathlon suits looking way too fit for their own good. They also look totally shattered, however, as they crawl their way up Croagh Patrick’s boulder-strewn, precipitous slopes. Thick mist swirls around them as they attempt to find the summit, and all around them thick snow impedes their progress and freezes their naked, shaven legs.

  I feel cold and tired just looking at these images. But if I am to keep my post-natal racing promise, I have no choice but to enter this Sea to Summit race.

  I soon discover the reason why the photos are full of fit and thin sportsmen and women. Sea to Summit is the last race on Ireland’s National Adventure Race Series calendar. Athletes are signing up in their droves to earn much-needed points for their final rankings before the season ends. This also means that thousands of competitors will attend the event. There is no risk of last-minute race cancellation this time around.

  I tell Eamonn about my reluctant decision. ‘Go for it,’ he says as he shuffles my training schedule around to suit this change in plan.

  With my first race scheduled, training starts to tick along quite nicely. It has taken a while, however, to get into the swing of things. Babysitting obligations have caused a bit of back and forth with Eamonn about how to fit sessions in. We’ve finally worked out ways to ensure I’m not out of the house for more than ninety minutes. Where there are two sessions to do, they are both done in the morning rather than staggered over the day. Rest days are moved around to fit into random baby activities.

  There is something about this formal, structured training that is really working for me. Maybe it’s the fact that each session has a defined purpose, whether it is to build strength, aerobic capacity, or a chance for me to rest. With Eamonn involved, I don’t have to think about what session I should do, or why.

  My own mother also comes to my aid to help facilitate my training. Twice a week, I hand Aran over to her, and she looks after him.

  ‘Are you sure you’re okay with this, Mum?’ I ask, as I am about to head out for my bike spin on one of her designated days. Even though Mum is totally up for babysitting Aran, I still feel like I am abandoning her as much as I am deserting my own child. Will I ever get over this irrational guilt complex I have of leaving Aran with someone else?

  ‘You know I love looking after Aran,’ Mum says, flashing her grandson a mighty grin. ‘Now off you go, my dear,’ ushering me out the front door.

  She may be in her seventies, but Mum finds a new lease of life when she’s around her new grandchild. I have no idea what they get up to while I’m away, but I have my deep suspicions. I arrive in after my bike ride, with the kitchen in total chaos. There are cuddly toys and baby books strewn all across the floor. Aran’s seat is deserted.

  ‘Mum, Mum, where are you guys?’ I call.

  ‘Shhhhhh,’ she says, before whispering loudly, ‘We’re in the living room.’

  I make my way to the other room, stepping over some rattles and blocks on my way. I had left the place spotless. I come back to find it booby-trapped.

  I see Mum plonked down on the sofa, with half an eye open. Aran is fast asleep on her belly, with a cosy blue blanket draped across both of them.

  ‘How did it go?’ I ask, thinking I might already know the answer.

  ‘We had great craic altogether,’ Mum says. ‘Though I might have tired Aran out a little bit.’

  Aran looks peaceful as he snuggles himself up close to his granny, who looks like she could do with a little nap right now as well.

  ‘Thanks for looking after him, Mum. I think I can take it from here.’

  ‘Not at all,’ Mum says. ‘Sure leave him here with me, and go have a shower or something.’

  I hate leaving Aran with others longer than I need to, but I get the impression that Mum is trying to get rid of me. Aran and Mum are becoming best buddies. It seems to me that Mum is trying to spend as much time as she can with him.

  Between Granny, the crèche and Pete, Aran now has someone to look after him most days of the week. It allows me to train consistently. However, I still have much to learn about how to train properly. I go for a ninety-minute bike ride one day and upload my data once I’m home. I think I’ve done a nice fast session and wait for positive feedback to come. Instead, Eamonn takes one look at my heart rate graph and scolds me. ‘Your heart rate was too high for the session,’ he writes on my plan. ‘It needs to be more stable.’

  I look at the data Eamonn has just slated. When I bike uphill, my heart rate soars. And when I freewheel downhill, the heart rate drops dramatically.

  ‘It needs to be close to a flat line,’ Eamonn tells when I speak to him next. ‘I shouldn’t be able to tell what type of terrain you’re going over.’

  ‘So I need to hold back when going uphill, and push harder going down?’ It is the total opposite of what normally happens when I go out biking with a group.

  ‘For this type of session, yes, that’s exactly what you need to do,’ Eamonn explains.

  Though I severely doubt what Eamonn is telling me, I figure he’s the coach in this relationship. There must be some sort of method to his madness if he comes so highly recommended.

  Not many people want to ride their bikes in the way Eamonn is instructing me. I struggle to find anyone who wants to pedal at a pace that is dictated solely by how fast my heart beats. The time of day I go training now is also governed by childcare availability. Not many amateur athletes are available, however, to train at 10 am on weekdays. These two mitigating factors mean that, if I want to adhere strictly to my training plan, I have to train on my own.

  Though I initially doubt I am training hard enough or long enough, my fitness levels start to improve. Eamonn has me checking my resting heart rate in the morning, as soon as I wake up. The beats slowly decrease week on week, dipping below forty as the Sea to Summit race approaches. Having a lower resting heart rate is a sure sign that I am doing something right.

  The day before the race, Aran, Pete and I pack
up our gear and make our way to Westport. We arrive in the town at 5 pm, just as it is getting dark. The early sunset time is a sign that winter is truly setting in.

  There is so much to do before I can race tomorrow. First I have to collect my race number. However, I forget to bring my mandatory kit to registration, and have to run back to the car to get it. I need to show the officials a first aid kit, a foil blanket, a whistle, a jacket, and my bike helmet before they will hand over my number. All these things I also need to carry on the course tomorrow in case of any accidents.

  I open the car boot and start to rummage around in my bags to find the required items. Unfortunately, with it being night-time already, I can barely see a thing. I wasn’t prepared to present them at registration, a failure on my part to read the final event instructions. I had packed them away safely before travelling, thinking I would put them together just before the start. Pete, Aran and I are all tired and grumpy from the long day’s journey. Looking for a whistle in a stack of bags is the last thing I need right now.

  I manage to get the required bits and pieces together and present them at registration. In addition to my number, I get a timing dibber and a sticker for my bike.

  ‘You need to drop your bike down to Westport Quay now,’ the official tells me, as I’m about to leave the building. Westport Quay is a five-minute drive from the centre of town. Bike needs to be there all ready and waiting for me tomorrow morning, after the first four-kilometre run.

  It is pitch black when we park our car at the quays. There are no streetlights installed in this deserted part of town. Normally empty at this time of night, the place is now buzzing with cars, loaded with racers and their bikes. This time I’m organised, and I have Bike already kitted out with his sticker, a full bottle of water, and my cycle helmet. However, some are not so fortunate, and are trying to pump up tyres and fix brakes under the gaze of weak head-torch beams. I cycle the short distance to the racks and drop Bike in his allocated spot. I leave him there, wishing him a safe and sound night.