Pregnancy & Movement
It’s important to keep moving throughout your pregnancy to help prevent pain, improve sleep, boost your mood and to help with your baby’s arrival and Pilates is a great form of movement to help strengthen your changing body.
Up to around 12-16 weeks you can do pretty much do everything exercise wise – it’s important to listen to your body though as often in the 1st trimester you can feel low energy or sick as your hormone levels significantly fluctuate. Throughout your entire pregnancy it’s still safe to strengthen your deep core muscles, obliques, back, arms, legs and glutes! Basically your entire body!
From weeks 12 – 16 onwards though there are some movements you need to avoid:
Abdominal crunches – As your body grows your rectus abdominis (ya six pack muscles) separate to make room for the baby, performing sit ups at this point will strengthen the muscles in their separated state which can worsen diastasis recti (abdominal wall separation) and make it harder to heal. It is SUPER important however to keep strengthening your other core muscles, toe taps propped up on your elbows is a great way to do this, or kneeling side planks.
Lying on your front – Quite an obvious one! Most prone exercises you can modify and do them from all 4’s. This might be one to avoid post-natal too if you’re sore from feeding.
Lying on your back – You can still lie on your back during pregnancy just not for too long. Pressure on major blood vessels can lead to dizziness. Most women feel ok lying on their backs for 3-5 mins at a time, everyone is different though and it’s important you tune into what works for you, your body and your baby. You can still perform movement from your back, just roll on to your side every few mins to release any pressure.
Over stretching – Your body is full of a hormone called Relaxin throughout pregnancy which helps to loosen ligament and joints in preparation for delivery. Relaxin affects all joints and ligaments though and you may notice that you are more flexible, try not to push into stretches more just because you can, this can lead to joint injuries.
Some women also find single leg work painful because of changes to the pelvis, if this is you, stick to double leg work such as a shallow standing squat.
Your balance is important to work on still throughout your pregnancy but as your body grows your centre of gravity will change. Any moves that require some form of balance, just take slowly and make sure you have a support near you.
Other things to note are try and eat before your class to balance blood sugars, come well hydrated and bring water with you, wear comfy loose clothing to move in and the most important thing that I legit repeat constantly – LISTEN TO YOUR BODY. Every body and pregnancy is different, some days we might have more energy than others and that’s ok. If you need to rest, rest, if you’re full of beans and want to level up, go for it. It’s an important time to tune into the body, listen to what it’s telling you it needs. You got this mama!
Keen to get started? Head to my online workouts where there are over 20 pre/post natal friendly classes to try out!