6 BENEFITS OF YOGA DURING PREGNANCY (and Jenny’s Fave Classes to Try!)
The journey to motherhood is a super exciting one, but it can also be stressful, tiring, full on and confusing. Fortunately yoga Fortunately, yoga can offer numerous benefits for mammas-to-be. The practise of yoga promotes everything from circulation, breath work, and increased physical strength to mental tenacity, which is key for not only giving birth but helping your body in the recovery after birth too.
A yoga class with a prenatal certified teacher will also give you the opportunity to also help release aches and pains of pregnancy life too, says Jenny, (Head of Yoga , Mamma to Fred and Co Founder of Balance + Glo). And it’s amazing breathing techniques will help support you through labour too. You’ll find a mix of classes to help soothe, strengthen and support the body and mind through pregnancy as part of Bump + Beyond on The Online Studio.
Jenny talks you through 6 other perks of practicing yoga during pregnancy below.
1. Reduce Stress
Stress isn’t great at any time in life, but especially when you’re pregnant. Yoga helps to bring you into the present moment by connecting your mind to your breath and your breath to your movement." It also allows you to take time in a busy schedule to connect with your growing baby.
“Bringing awareness and attention to your body and your baby for a few moments in your day is a beautiful way to find calm in a time which can feel very alien. I’ve found that just by sitting and placing one hand on your belly and one hand on your heart allows this moment of connection in what can feel like a time when everything around you is moving so fast and changing ” says Jenny.
2. Breathe Easy
As your baby grows, so does the pressure and resistance against your diaphragm, impacting your ability to breathe. During yoga practice, many of the physical movements help to open your chest, ribs, and diaphragm so that you can continue to breathe more normally as your pregnancy progresses - think chest opening and side bends. You can use some of the amazing breathing techniques to help support you into labour and beyond. My favourite breathing technique is Golden Thread Breath - try it out by clicking the link below.
3. Relieve aches and pains
With pregnancy brings lots of change to our bodies. For example the hormone relaxin loosening the joints, lordosis of the spine-can cause many aches and pains, hip flexors can tighten and the weight of bump can cause issues for neck and shoulders too. Fortunately, many yoga postures will stretch and relieve the areas of the body that may feel some of these aches and pains. I suffered from lower back pain and found that yoga really was my go to cure during the later stages of pregnancy too.
Suffering from swollen ankles? Why not try Legs up the wall. An extremely restorative and simple pose and can be done propped up on blocks, bolsters, or pillows, when lying on the back is no longer appropriate in your pregnancy.
4. Maintain and build strength
Yoga can help to maintain and build strength at the best of times both inside and out. With so many changes happening to your body and with a journey ahead of you its so important to find that inner strength within. One of my favourite poses during pregnancy was goddess pose and the warrior poses as they not only helped to build strength in my legs (which helped during labour!) but mentally were empowering and gave me the strength to keep going when things felt tough. So much so that i filmed a goddess flow just for you!
5. Labour preparation
Most prenatal yoga classes are full of poses to aid in strengthening the parts of your body (pelvic floor, hips, core, lower body) necessary for labour. I’ve also filmed a short class aimed for mums-to-be + 34 weeks into pregnancy to try to encourage your baby into the right position for birth. The term used is optimal foetal positioning. Join me to try positions to encourage the best positioning for baby.
6. Community
Having a support community through pregnancy and into parent hood is key for emotional well-being. That’s why we’ve set up a Facebook community group where mammas to be and mammas can share their experiences, knowledge and ask any questions at all!! We will also be running in person Bump + Beyond events in the near future so make sure you join the awesome community to be the first to know.