If you pee a little when you jump, your back hurts and you don't know why, or you simply feel like your body has never been the same since you had your kids - we (both mothers of three) can relate.

But you might have been told by other mothers "that's just what happens" or that's just perimenopause or (gasp) that's just age.

It's not. It's under-rehabilitation. And we called in sports medicine physician Dr. Morgan Lee to settle the score.

​DR. MORGAN LEE is a sports medicine doc who has worked with collegiate athletes at USC (cough; Amanda's alma mater, go Trojans) and the pro NBA basketballers of the Cleveland Cavaliers.

​

At some point she started noticing something: the same movement dysfunction she was treating in high-level athletes — weak glutes, poor hip control, core that doesn't fire — kept appearing in her postpartum patients, years and sometimes decades after their last pregnancy.

The "injuries" had different names, but the mechanisms were identical. And unlike the athletes, the mothers had never been offered proper rehab.

Instead, women get a six-week check and a fairly-BS "cleared for exercise" note that, as Dr. Morgan puts it, speaks no language in regards to healing. This conventional treatment protocol is unfair, underserving women, and to be perfectly clear, unacceptable from the perspective of those of us in our forties still paying dues for something we should've been able to address years ago.

This conversation is for the woman in her forties who has been simply managing her body since babies, because nobody told her rebuilding it was still an option. It is.

Listen now to the full conversation with Dr. Morgan Lee.

One thing worth trying this weekend

Stand in front of a mirror. Lower into a bodyweight squat and watch what your knees do.

Then try it on one leg — just a small, shallow single-leg squat — and see whether you can control the movement, or whether your knee drifts inward, your hip drops, or you reach for something to hold.

You are just looking for information here (no judgment!). If one side moves differently from the other, or if the single-leg version reveals something that the two-legged version hides, that is your body telling you something about what did not get rebuilt after pregnancy.

It is not a verdict. It is a starting point. And it may be time to show that starting point to a personal trainer or physio for more.

With a little less "bouncing back" and a lot more building forward,
​Amanda & Jasmin​

A word from our sponsor, Cozy Earth

​Dr. Morgan lists rest as one of the non-negotiables of postpartum recovery, not a luxury item for the chosen few. Sleep is infrastructure. Jasmin and Amanda both use Cozy Earth's bamboo bedding because it is the only thing we have actually found that regulates temperature through the night in Singapore. The sheets are worth it, and — crucially — they ship here.

Use code TFF for 31% off at cozyearth.com.