Training for Life – Yours and Your Baby’s

by Victoria Diaz, SSC | October 07, 2025

Training isn’t just for sport or aesthetics. It’s for life.

I began barbell training in the summer of 2016, around my 22nd birthday. I weighed 149 pounds, and my starting numbers were: squat 105x5x3, press 35x5x3, bench 75x5x3, deadlift 135x5. Over the next seven years, I brought my bodyweight up to 174 pounds, and my personal bests reached: squat 260x1, press 119x1, bench 155x1, deadlift 326x1.

Training saw me through a lot – illness, two years of full-time school and work, my wedding in 2019, the year 2020, two moves across the country, and even rehab after a car accident. But I had never trained through a pregnancy. Not yet.

Through all those seasons, barbell training taught me resilience. The ability to go through hard things and come out stronger – physically and mentally. I’ve squatted with 245 pounds on my back and felt the bar freeze mid-rep for what felt like minutes. I’ve pulled on deadlifts that didn’t move…until they did. I’ve pressed weights that felt like they would fold me in half, only to stand up with them. Every rep completed and every bar racked reinforced what I was capable of.

In the spring of 2023, my husband and I found out we were expecting our first child that December. At the time, I was 29 years old, standing 5’6”, weighing 160 pounds, and squatting 225x3x2. (I was also pressing and deadlifting regularly, though I don’t recall the exact numbers.) I had coached many women through pregnancy and postpartum by then, but now it was my turn.

There isn’t much research out there on strength training through pregnancy, but what we do know is this: the stronger you are, the better you’ll handle the task in front of you. And pregnancy is no exception. I was excited to live what I’d been preaching for years.

I had no idea just how critical it would be.

That’s life, isn’t it? You often don’t see the payoff of your efforts until the end. Friends would say, “I don’t know how you do it. I just want to go home and sit on the couch.” And trust me, I did too. But I knew that wouldn’t serve my goal. I wanted to be strong through my pregnancy. I wanted to be strong for labor, delivery, and postpartum. So I focused on the outcome, not how I felt.

At the end, my boss and I tallied up how many training sessions I completed while pregnant. I hit over 90% of my planned workouts. I got sick a couple of times, and we moved apartments, which threw off the routine. I definitely had days where I went home and slept for three hours instead of training. But most of the time? I showed up. I kept putting the bar on my back.

We had been planning a home birth long before I got pregnant. We wanted as little intervention as possible, and home seemed like the best environment for that.

Like many women, I had imagined birth as something calm. A quiet room, dim lights, maybe worship music in the background. A peaceful, beautiful experience. Maybe that was just me trying to manifest something, but it’s what I pictured anyway.

What I didn’t picture was going into labor already sick. Three days before labor began, I started coughing – badly. I rarely get respiratory bugs. If I’m sick, it’s usually a fever and a couple days of sleep. But this was different. I was coughing so violently that my chest and abdomen ached, and I kept peeing myself from the pressure. I remember begging our son: “Just a couple more days. Let me get better first.”

But babies don’t listen. On the night of December 27th, around 9 pm, contractions started. By 10 p.m., my water broke. We took my temperature: 102°F. My midwife arrived at 11:30 pm to check everything. I had a confirmed fever, and our baby’s heart rate was elevated.

With those concerns, she recommended we transfer to the hospital for closer monitoring. We arrived at the hospital around midnight. Contractions were picking up fast. While checking in, my midwife said she thought this baby would be coming sooner than expected.

At the hospital, I was given an IV for hydration and started on antibiotics for the infection. We declined all other interventions. I labored in whatever position felt best, and I found myself spending most of the time on my knees. Not exactly restful—but it was the most comfortable.

I had a monitor on my belly the entire time to track the baby’s heart rate. After 8 hours of labor – 5 of them on my knees – I delivered our 10 lb 4 oz son vaginally, without an epidural.

It wasn’t the birth I imagined. I would not recommend going into labor with a fever and respiratory infection. But at no point did I feel like my body was going to give out. Not once. My legs, my back, my whole system held strong.

So what happens when you get the opposite of what you hoped for? When life throws you something far from ideal? What physical state will you be in to handle it? Strength training doesn’t guarantee an easy birth. But it builds the ability to endure.

Labor didn’t go the way I imagined. It was messy, painful, and completely out of my control. But I never doubted my body’s ability to keep going. I never felt weak. Not once.

Strength training doesn’t guarantee a smooth birth. It doesn’t make life easier. But it builds something deeper: resilience, grit, the ability to keep moving forward when nothing goes to plan. That’s what training gave me. And that’s what I’ll carry with me – not just into motherhood, but into everything else life throws my way.