I'm Inspired by Alex Morgan's Intense Pregnancy Training Schedule

My feelings towards soccer superstar Alex Morgan have always been complicated. On the one hand, she is an incredible talent and a key figure in the fight for equal pay. On the other hand, she is also my partner’s dream woman so in some twisted reality in my mind, Morgan is the competition. This is clearly a delusion, but it’s the one I’ve chosen to accept.

But alas, by simply existing, Alex Morgan outdoes me once more and instead of being envious I am now inspired. In an interview with Glamour, Morgan posed on a beach, eight months pregnant appearing as the goddess of joy. She spoke with Macaela MacKenzie about her career and what it was like to continue training through her pregnancy before the announcement that the Olympics would be postponed. Prior to the announcement, Morgan had said she planned to give birth in April and get into Olympic shape in time to play on Team USA by July. In anticipation of a July Games, Morgan continued her normal training up until the seventh month of her pregnancy, “which included six days a week of intense workouts—on-the-field sessions, weight training, Spin classes, runs,” according to Glamour. Once she crossed the seven-month threshold she only slightly slowed things down with, “regular jogs, physical therapy, pelvic-floor physical therapy,[and] prenatal yoga.”

I am zero months pregnant, have quite a bit of newfound time on my hands and do you know what my training schedule is? Walking to the garbage room in my apartment building. Every now and again I might do an online class or attempt a run outside. But here goes Alex Morgan, leaping through a beach, kicking a soccer ball, jogging on the regular as if there’s not a tiny human life sucking all her energy from the inside. “It’s not like women can’t do both—our bodies are incredible—it’s the fact that this world isn’t really set up for women to thrive,” Morgan said in her Glamour interview.

Alex Morgan has inspired me to reassess my at-home workouts and social distance runs. But more than that she’s inspired me to bury the hatchet between us—a hatchet she never knew existed because she’s too busy living life and outworking. Honestly, if my partner ever manages to meet and woo this woman I should probably forge him a medal or something.