I love my exercise I really do – as you may have guessed. For the first 12 weeks I managed – around bouts of morning sickness – to fit in a fairly respectable regime.

This included 5km cycles  on the static bike, or 15 minutes on the spinning bike followed by weights,  or  20 minute runs on the treadmill (with a minimum 3% incline as anything else is cheating) or some circuits around the park. I even fitted in my pregnancy yoga DVD (Shiva Rea) and some pilates classes.

Nothing like my pre-pregnancy regime of 2x spinning class, 3/4 x30 minutes of yoga, 2 runs (including a 10k most weeks) but still I was feeling proud of myself, I was doing best for baby and me.

I’d wanted to keep up the spinning but all the teachers have effectively banned me, claiming that even if I kept the resistance low and didn’t do any of the more fancy moves (such as riding out of the seat) a mild spot of spinning still involved a lot of pelvis bumping, which was not good for the baby. As most of the teachers have had babies themselves- I took their advice more seriously than I might some of the male teachers – who also advised against by the way.

Then I read about Nell McAndrew, doing a minimum of a 10k run every day. Phew! Lucky lady. At  first I’ll admit I felt jealous, then a bit guilty (I am a Catholic after all) then I realised that I’d downsized my regime (which I’ve been told is almost athletic standard) for a reason – I was pregnant!

I know Nell is very fit and runs marathons, but I still couldn’t help but compare myself with her.  Had I’d become a lazy, pregnant lady?

The answer was obviously ‘no’ and I found out as much when I went for the first scan, the 12 week job.

I was weighed just before the scan and to my surprise,  I’d only managed to put on 2lbs, or less than  a kilo,  in the first three months of my pregnancy.

The baby was fine, after all it takes everything first but my body was obviously working overtime. So over the following fews days I kept dragging myself to the gym nonetheless.

Then we had our first baby scare, a blood test had shown I had above average levels  of HCG ( the pregnancy hormone that makes that blue line appear on the pregnancy test). No only did it explain my morning sickness it also  indicated there may be a problem with the baby.

Within days we’d been booked to have a private CVS test at a hospital in London.  The test involved having a needle inserted into my tummy in order to extract some of the placenta, which would be tested for various genetic abnomalities.

The test was clear as we found out just two days later, but having a  CVS increases the risk of miscarriage for up to two to three weeks afterwards. Three weeks during which the only exercise I will be doing is lifting food to my mouth, if I can manage to keep it down that is.

I’ve had my reality check, exercise is great for maintaining or at the very least keeping up a modicum of my previous fitness, so I can benefit from all those years of training my pregnancy. But that’s why I kept fit, to have a healthy baby, and doing 10k runs every day – for me – is probably a fitness regime too far.

That’s not to say I’m going to sit on the sofa and scoff myself  either, I’m going to be going to body balance and yoga.

I’ll have to avoid reading about ladies who do marathons while pregnant and stick to what is best for me, and that means trying to stay pregnant and healthy.

Oh and buying a maternity bra, which is what I’m probably going to be blogging about next.

When I compete it’s generally against myself.  At work I always ask myself – can I better my last exclusive/write cleaner copy etc? In the gym I try to use heavier weights/stay a bit longer on the cycle/treadmill than during my last visit.  I try not to get competitive with friends – that’s asking for trouble and with family – well why would I?

I ran my first 10k in ages this last weekend. Now this time last year I managed to run 4 10km runs over 4 weekends. Quite a feat – for anyone. Especially someone who was warned (at age 16) that long distance running would damage my legs.

So I was quite shocked when half way through this run – at the 5km point – I slowed down to the extent that I wanted to quit. Like really, really wanted to quit.  I’ve never felt quite so like giving up – in a race – as I did at that point.

I knew I’d not done enough training, so had anticipated it would be tough, but I could not have anticipated exactly how tough it would be.

I talked myself out of it, reminding myself that if my grandmothers had chosen to ‘quit’ during the Blitz I – and my parents – wouldn’t be here today.

It seemed to work, and I even managed to make up a bit of time, although not enough to beat my fastest time of 55 minutes (which I did during my first ever 10k run).

Running’s not the best sport if you are in need of motivation – there’s no teamwork involved – as there is when putting a website/newspaper/magazine together

I could really have done with a friend – a running buddy on this race.  But although my time was rubbish, it was actually the best race I’ve run.

And next week I’ll be doing it again with my sister at the Race for Life in Harlow. While I know I’ll probably never be able to run a marathon, I know I’m not a quitter, and that’s just as good.

What do you do when you’ve too much to do and not enough time in which to do it? But if you don’t do any of it, nothing ends up getting done at all.

This is the dilemma freelance journalists such as myself face. Meeting up with contacts – whether or not they are friends – is essential if you are to get story ideas or even good old-fashioned exclusives. But time away from the office (or the typeface) means time away from writing up the stories you have got.

But it’s a little bit less of a dilemma when meeting up with contacts allows you the luxury of having some pampering at the same time.

I very nearly cancelled my meeting with one PR this week, I was stuck in case-study hell, when sourcing someone to illustrate my story on a certain financial product ended up being way more difficult than it should have been.

But rather than cancel I opted for multi-tasking, so while the PR and I chatted, we both had a pedicure and at the same time I managed to source a case study and file my story.

It was stressful but I got three things done, made a contact, filed a story and ended up with pretty feet (in Jessica’s gothic black shade) courtesy of the Sanctuary in Covent Garden, oh and thanks to an understanding PR and pedicurists who have probably seen it all, and worse, before.

This type of networking is nothing new by the way, a few years back I used to do spin classes with contacts.

As an aside, I’ve been sent a pair of Hi Tech V-Lite Infinity running shoes to test.  I’m wearing them as we speak.

They may nearly supplant my Adidas Stella McCartney running shoes, which also look very funky (and glow in the dark), as my wear-anywhere trainer.

In fact they are so comfy I might not even swap into my normal shoes today..

Read more on Ella Mag:

Win a pair of wellies

Ella Mag’s Samantha and Katie have entered the 10k Race for Life this summer.

It’s Katie’s first ever 10k and she’s feeling nervous while  Samantha, who managed four 10ks over four consecutive weekends last May,  hasn’t run any distance races for a while (since last May in fact).

Each week they will be charting their fitness progress and sharing their tips with you. You can sponsor them – or even better join them at a Race for Life near you.

We ought to warn you that before attempting any form of exercise you should get yourself checked out by your GP. We’re not saying you’re unfit, just that it’s better to be safe – lecture over!

Week one

Chris at our local Nuffield gym gave us this basic programme, which you can build up depending on how fitter you get. You can also adapt it if you’d rather exercise outdoors, by doing timed jobs combined with walking, and as you get fitter jogs punctuated with sprints; you’ll need to find a park where you can mark your circuits (timing them means having to faff around with a watch)

If you have access to a gym you’ll need a treadmill.

Start with a three minute warm up, you need a gradient of at least 2 (0 just doesn’t cut it sorry) at around 6-6.5km.

After three minutes increase your speed to 7.5km, aim to do this for two minutes, then you can go back down to the slower speed.  If you are new to exercise you may just want to aim for ten minutes.

As you get fitter you can  increase the top speed to 9km which you should aim to do for a minute. You’ll also need to turn the gradient up. Go back down to 7.5km as your’ rest’. Start with one round and aim to do at least three times a week. Each week increase the number of rounds you do.

And chill!

Having flexibility is great for overall health, Samantha and Katie are winding down each training session with a few downward dogs. If you know the basics you can round off your training with a few sun salutations. If not get thee to a yoga class.  The British Wheel of Yoga has a great website where you can find your nearest qualified yoga teacher

If this article has inspired you, you might want to read  Jeff Prestridge’s 10 marathons in 10 days  (yep you’ve read that right) challenge this May. He’s blogging about it, and you can donate here.

Like this. Read more here.