Baby steps: How to help get your fitness back on track after having kids

We talk to two high-performing athletes about how they eased themselves back into peak condition after giving birth

Eimear Considine with 10-month Caolán at home in Kilmihil, Co Clare. Picture: Eamon Ward

When mother of two and 12 times All-Ireland water polo champion Mairéad Baker got pregnant, it never crossed her mind that it would be the end of her sporting life. “At what level I’d return, I didn’t know. But at 27, I knew I wasn’t finished with sport.”

Baker’s partner, Eoin, is also a water polo athlete. “I told him ‘I’m going back. I’m doing this thing for us for 40 weeks. It’s on you then to help me on the far side’.”