Jill Moffatt is an Olympian and freelance journalist
When I went to the Olympics with the Canadian rowing team this summer, I was unsure of where my path would lead afterward.
My plan was to compete at the Games and see how I felt after a healthy break from rowing. At 28-years-old, with a graduate degree and a partner of eight years, there was a lot to think about. Should I come back and try for another Olympics? Should I pursue a career and save for a house? When do I want to have children?
Now, almost five months later, I have begun training for the next Olympics — I want to chase my childhood dream of standing on the podium one last time. And, as a woman, I find the questions I face around this decision are focused on my role as a prospective mother.
What about children? Are you going to have kids right after the next Olympics? How will you save enough to support a family? I see many of my teammates facing the same questions — and for those who are older, the decision has been hastened by the biological clock ticking in the background.
Now more than ever, coming back to sport after having children is a reality for many athletes — and many are competing at the highest level. At every Olympics, there are many mothers who compete, and although this won’t be how my story ends, I became interested in hearing from these athletes and learning about their experiences.
When I began interviewing athletes and researchers who focus on women athletes returning to sport post-pregnancy, what surprised me was the lack of guidelines and scientific research. With all these moms returning to training, I figured there must be some clear rules to follow.
What I learned is that many of these women are forging their own paths, with the help of family, their family doctor, and support from teammates.
The Pressure to ‘Bounce Back’
“I think with pregnancies and having babies, there's just that expectation or need to prove to everybody how quickly you can bounce back. Whether you're coming back to sport or not. I think it's something a lot of women try to do, to be able to say oh, well, I lost all the baby weight this fast, or, oh, well, I came back to sport within six weeks,” says two-time Olympic gold-medallist, Meaghan Mikkelson.
Mikkelson knows a thing or two about ‘bouncing back’ after having children — she has returned to sport twice after giving birth, once following the Sochi Olympics, and again after the Olympics in Pyeongchang.
But it’s not as simple as giving birth, throwing on your runners, and beginning to train again. Anyone who has gone through labor can tell you that — yet the research and guidance on how to return to elite activity postpartum is inadequate.
“The interesting thing about pregnancy and postpartum, especially with elite athletes, is that we don't even have good evidence-based recommendations in terms of what is most appropriate,” said Dr. McHugh and Dr. Davenport from the University of Alberta, whose research focuses on women returning to sport post-pregnancy.
For athletes, whose careers depend on a deep understanding of their bodies, many find themselves in unchartered territory — navigating recovery and returning to training with minimal research to support their comeback, alongside a body that doesn’t function the way it did pre-pregnancy.
“I think as an athlete, you're so used to doing something to your body. When you recover, you're like, I acknowledge the damage I've done — because I did it to my body and therefore, I must recover,” says Olympic rowing silver medallist Lindsay Jennerich. “But with pregnancy, it’s different — it's happening to me. Therefore, there's nothing to recover from because I didn't make a physical choice to damage myself. Ultimately, I'm underestimating that trauma on my body.”
Underestimating the physical trauma of giving birth is a position that many athletes find themselves in. “Our reviews were showing that postpartum individuals were actually coming back very early. Some are coming back a week after delivery, six weeks after delivery, and doing around 64 kilometers of running a week,” said McHugh and Davenport.
Kim Gaucher, who has been on the Canadian women’s basketball team since 2001, became pregnant a year out from the Tokyo Olympics — which gave her a limited window of time to recover and then try out for the Olympic team.
At 10 weeks postpartum she joined Team Canada camps and slowly worked her way back to full health, making the Olympic team and being named as team captain.
“It's so hard because you look at your body, and you're like, okay, it's amazing what you've been able to do, like, you birthed a human, that's exceptional. But then at the same time, when you're a high-performance athlete, you're so used to your body doing what you've trained basically your whole life to do. It just doesn't respond in the same way,” says Gaucher.
“You're like, I know I have to give it time. I know that it'll get there. But it's just so frustrating that it's not there now.”
Injuries From Coming Back Quickly
Like Gaucher, Mikkelson knows what it’s like to come back with such a short timeline. When Mikkelson returned to hockey after having her first child, she was trying out for Team Canada’s World Championship team — only four months postpartum.
“It actually ended up having one of the best camps of my career. And I think it's all the blur of being a new mom, I was still breastfeeding, my son was four months old, he was at the camp with me, up in the middle of the night, feeding him running back and forth from the rink to the hotel. So, I really didn't have a lot of time to think about being nervous,” says Mikkelson.
Many women report feeling physically able to begin training soon after giving birth. But one of the prevailing issues that new mothers face is, despite how they’re feeling, their bodies have changed and that requires a different level of care than pre-pregnancy — and without proper guidelines, many find themselves on the brink of injury.
After Mikkelson made the team, she competed at the World Championships two months later, but injuries caught up with her. “At the World Championships, I was double groin wrapped. I had bursitis in my shoulder. I had tendinitis in my wrist, I was a mess. I was pulling my groin and throwing out my back, left, right, and center,” said Mikkelson.
When Mikkelson had her second child, she had a different experience. “I had a lot more time to come back after I had my daughter. I didn't have to be at camp until she was nine months old. I gave myself time, or my body, the time to heal. And I gave myself more time to come back. I had no injuries.”
Mikkelson’s two different experiences reflect what is now seen in the research, waiting longer to return can enhance your body’s ability to adapt under the stresses of activity. With more research being done on women returning to elite sport postpartum, athletes will soon have access to research-based guidelines that are more suitable — and sports organizations can learn from this research to better support athletes in returning to sport cautiously.
Looking Ahead
Although my story won’t end with an Olympic gold medal and a child — Jennerich assures me that when my time comes, I’ll be ready.
“The difference between training and having a child, is that your body is geared towards supporting you — your strength, your mentality, your focus, everything just takes over and it works in your favor,” says Jennerich.
Olympian Rower, Jill Moffatt, and teammate Jennifer Casson
And while the women I interviewed recalled the pressure to return and injures they endured, they also told beautiful stories of what it is like to be a mother and an athlete. They see themselves as any other working mother — but to me, they are much more than that. They are showing the world that a women’s athletic career is not defined by her womb, that women can do both.
And with researchers like McHugh and Davenport working in the background to help provide better research and resources for athletes, I feel confident that the future for women in sport is looking brighter.