Rough Guide to Prenatal Exercise
Hey Hey Barre Babes,
Rough Guide to Prenatal Exercise
One of the best parts of my job is that I get to work with people, mainly women of childbearing age, to empower them in their bodies, fitness and wellness goals. While every woman and every pregnancy is unique, I've noticed some common misconceptions about prenatal exercise safety and confusion as to what to expect while you're exercising pregnant.
Moving mindfully throughout my first and now second pregnancy has saved my sanity, kept me grounded and connected to my body, helped me deal with common pre/postpartum discomforts, and made my recovery to full strength and a better-than-ever body relatively easy. However, it's important to remember that pregnancy is not the time to strive for a personal best record, train for your first marathon, or really to pursue any other physical goal aside from feeling good, strong, connected and confident.
To that end, here's my rough guide to caring for your prenatal body through movement.
Tip #1: YOU'RE STILL YOU
The main thing is to understand that the physical changes of pregnancy are both gradual and constant. You don't suddenly become a different person with a totally different body and strength level the second you get pregnant, or enter your second or third trimester. The body changes a little bit each day, and it's important to be able to check in with and listen to your body, to adapt to the changes while maintaining a sense of self and center.
Tip #2: YOU ARE THE BOSS
Pregnancy is an amazing opportunity to develop pathways of communication with your body and to learn to decode and trust its signals, and it's good to remember that YOU know best what's right for YOU. Unfortunately in our culture, it's also a time of heavy policing by the outside world. Coworkers, relatives, friends, blogs, Pilates instructors, even doctors can all make suggestions, provide guidance and counsel, direct you towards research-backed beneficial practices, but ultimately, you are the goddess of your own garden and will know what's right for you.
Tip #3: DO it while it feels right, STOP when it doesn't
Many commonly repeated prescriptions for what to/what not to do when exercising pregnant are too reductive, too general, and need to be understood in the context of our litigious society and cultural tendency towards extremes. Most pregnancy advice veers towards the conservative because no one wants to be responsible for a negative outcome for a pregnant woman or her baby (duh) but also for CYA purposes so as not to get sued. Moreover, it's impossible to account for each individual woman and her unique conditions, and pretty much the only thing that's safe for everyone to do an extreme amount of while pregnant is sleep. But when it comes to movement that you care about and are proficient in, there are really no hard and fast rules about exactly when to stop (see Tip #1).
Take planks, for instance. Planks are not recommended exercise for pregnancy because they can place too much pressure on already stretched core muscles and contribute to diastasis rectii, or the thinning of the linea alba ligament that joins the sides of the abs together. But unless and until the core is stretched to the point that the center cannot hold, planks are great isometric strengthening exercises for the core muscles which actually helps prevent diastasis.
Precisely when the pregnant core should stop planking is different for every body. For me, planks are pretty much an every day occurrence in both my profession and my movement practices, and, being injury-free, it would stand to reason that my body might be able to plank a little longer into my pregnancy than someone brand new to working out. But even I am careful to stop when it feels like my form is suffering, because it's better to abstain than to do something with poor form.
Tip #4: Mindfully Modify
following this order:
1) Decrease duration/reps. Even in the first few weeks of pregnancy, the body is building blood (blood volume increases by 50% during pregnancy!), growing a baby and a placenta, and going haywire prepping for the weeks to come. This can lead to feeling winded or lightheaded during activity much, much faster than normal, and it's imperative to listen to those signals and take rest breaks as needed.
2) Modify form. As the body changes, familiar exercises are going to start to feel different as well. Pay close attention to maintaining perfect form, and if it doesn't feel right, change position to make it work. This might mean bringing one or both knees to the mat instead of holding a full plank, or making movements smaller, or sticking to single leg lift variations rather than double. (This is really where a session with a qualified movement professional can come in handy.)
3) Omit what your body doesn't need so you can focus on what it does need. Meaning, feel empowered to skip exercises that place undue stress on your core muscles and focus instead on deep breathing while engaging pelvic floor and transverse abs. Avoid exercises that require laying on the belly or that move directly from laying down to sitting up or vice versa and focus instead on strengthening your side body muscles and lateral hip muscles. Eventually, you'll omit abdominal flexion exercises (because really, they won't even make sense after awhile) and focus instead on strengthening the back and hips in extension. Focus on what your body wants and needs, not what it (temporarily) would rather avoid.
Other things to keep in mind:
1) Stay connected to your body. For me, the best way to do this is to keep moving, and everything from gentle stretching to hip circles to even a body scan-type meditation counts. When you mindfully move your body you keep the pathways open for you to listen to its messages and are better able to determine and provide what it needs.
For me, I've found the following signals and remedies to be useful:
feeling lightheaded in class ---> rest
feeling sluggish ---> do some gentle cardio
low back pain or heavy-feeling legs feel heavy ---> work lateral hip muscles, booty & hip extension
shortness of breath when sitting or relaxing ---> activate posture and breathing muscles, side body work, upper body tension release
pelvic floor pressure ---> time to chill
2) Roll with the changes and understand that they are gradual. A 12 week pregnant body is different from a 24 week pregnant body which is different from a 38 week pregnant body. Blanket prescriptions like "pregnant women shouldn't run/lift weights/planks/twist/do abs" are simply too general to matter to your unique, trained pregnant core.
I think the main reason they are so oft-repeated are because 1) at the extreme of pregnancy, these movements are neither possible nor desirable; 2) there are better exercises for pregnant bodies that need attention while pre-pregnancy goals can take a backseat for a little while 3) in a class or group exercise setting, it's best to teach in the most conservative way possible to protect both their participants from injury and themselves from liability. Again, listen to your body, modify for duration, then form, then omit!
3) Prioritize movements that:
1) connect you to your core (like TVA breathing and pelvic tucks)
2) stabilize the pelvis (like leg lift variations in quadruped)
3) mobilize the spine and major joints (like cat-cow, hip circles, shoulder rolls)
4) train the back of the body (booty-strengthening exercises, working with hips in extension, upper back and chest opening exercises
5) focus on your sides (like strengthening in side planks and mermaid stretches)
6) prioritize posture both throughout movement in general and specifically with Pilates exercises like chest expansion or serratus pushups.
Whew, that's a lot to do!
With love,
Annie
