Our approach to wellness at Tune Up Fitness is not static; it’s fluid. As such, we are always seeking new ways for therapeutic self-massage, mindset and body conditioning exercises to serve us through different phases of life… as opposed to trying to fit ourselves into a predefined prescription for “health”.
This fluid approach to wellness especially applies to major life/body events such as pregnancy.
There are many Tune Up teacher mamas out there, and it is always interesting to hear how their practices have shifted over the course of pregnancy, birth and into postpartum. Each creates her own approach to what “healthy” looks and feels like during this time, according to her own body.
This makes learning from these teacher-mamas quite fascinating, as you are sure to hear fresh insights and ideas.
How to Have a Mindful Pregnancy and Birth
Today we are featuring three Tune Up teachers who are also new mothers. Each has generously shared her personal approach to a mindful, conscious pregnancy. She shares how she adapted her fitness routine to her changing body. Plus how she approached self-care to support her unique needs through to childbirth.
We hope you mamas-to-be find inspiration to attune to your own internal guidance here (and please share with your pregnant friends!). We hope to help you meet your own needs, while using every technique and tool at your disposal to support an empowered journey into motherhood.
“From Feeling Stressed to Feeling Blessed”
Pregnancy is not only a special time for your baby to grow and become ready for the world but for you as a budding parent to grow your capacity to nurture yourself.
Improving this inner radar for sensing subtle changes in your own needs is a critical skill to hone as your time becomes more focused on your baby and less on yourself. It also helps you to develop that inner radar for understanding your baby so you can address and predict needs FOR them as they learn to interpret the world in those first years.
The questions you can ask regularly starting as early as pregnancy to encourage this positive inner relationship to develop is:
How am I feeling right now?
Am I tired, stressed, hungry, excited, afraid, overwhelmed, overstimulated, bored, lonely, anxious, happy? Any combinations?
What do I notice as I feel into those body states?
If you determine you are in a physical, energetic or emotional deficit, check your menu of self-care options to see if there’s anything that will help you feel better. You might wonder: Does chocolate cake qualify? Maaaaaybe… but at a certain point, using chocolate cake to soothe yourself can go from being an adaptive to a maladaptive behavior. Believe me, I have tried!
For me, self-massage on therapy balls is the quickest and easiest way to reset my physical and emotional tone from feeling stressed to feeling blessed! It is on my time, my dime and at its most primitive, it reminds me to breathe.
I now naturally find myself asking the above questions about how I’m feeling during a rolling session when I encounter tightness, stiffness or pain. So ultimately, the practice of rolling itself becomes reflective and feeds right into the inner dialogue you are looking to cultivate with yourself–with your body and your baby.
It sounds so simple but making a practice of cueing into yourself and learning how your body feels at any given moment (and then addressing it with effective interventions you know work well for you) is THE key to becoming a tuned-in parent.
“Nature Was the Best Place For Me”
How did I approach my pregnancy mindfully? I trusted my body! To adapt, to evolve and to tell me what is the best for me and my baby at that moment!
During pregnancy, I continued to move a lot but felt that ”impact” sports like running was not for me during that period. I wanted smooth and conscious movement; movements that require control, stability and finesse. I wanted to be deeply strong and rooted.
Nature was the best place for me to connect to myself and this little pea that was growing inside me. I loved the challenge of walking barefoot in the forest, up and down the hills or balancing on logs. I wanted sunlight, fresh air and quietness.
I rolled and practice self massage everyday. My 2 favorites techniques were massaging the sacrum with the Alpha and the global shear with the Coregeous in my upper back. Uddihana Bandha (diaphragm vacuum) was amazing to mobilize and strengthen my diaphragm and respiratory system. I also had a wonderful osteopath that followed me all the way through prenatal and postnatal.
My biggest tip? Trust yourself. Trust your body. Go slow and don’t rush to get back “in shape” after the birth. Keep moving consciously and with as much variety as possible. Take time for rest. I restarted running three years after the birth of my daughter. I avoided injuries and I feel so much more in tune with ”mon corps de maman” (my mom’s body) for having taken this time and trusted my own nature.
“There’s No Formula For Pregnancy”
Every person’s body is different from one day to the next, a fact that most of us humans try hard to reject and ignore most of the time. In pregnancy though, this reality makes itself known with the insistence of a hungry newborn.
In my first pregnancy, I found that a 10-minute daily meditation practice helped me handle all the changes I was experiencing, allowing me to be more curious and less judgmental about them. Prenatal yoga, which I also practiced most days, helped me feel physical and emotional space for my baby, and connect with him before his birth.
Now, two years later and pregnant with my second son, I still find value in these practices. Although I’ll admit that daily meditation is more challenging with a toddler running around.
I’m grateful that I also now have the tools of Yoga Tune Up® and The Roll Model® to help me through. Self-massage has been a pregnancy godsend. Plowing the therapy balls into the dense tissue under my shoulder blades brings pain and stress relief in equal measure, while breathing with the Coregeous® ball under my sacrum or diaphragm has brought me some of the quietest, most interoceptive moments of my pregnancy.
My hips and SI joints had pain throughout my first pregnancy. But this time, with the understanding of “body blind spots” and biomechanics that my Yoga Tune Up® teacher training gave me, I’ve crafted new practices for these discomforts. I’ve been able to move in ways that have helped address pain when it arises and prevent it most of the time.
There’s no formula for pregnancy, and no one set of tools that are right for everyone. But finding ways to attune to and befriend the often disconcerting, always miraculous changes of a pregnant body can help ease the physical and emotional transition to motherhood.
Planning For Your Own Mindful Pregnancy
We encourage you to seek out the teachings of Lillee, Mimi and Rachel during your own journey into motherhood. Also many of the techniques referenced above can be found in our Roll Model Mama at-home program, which will help you build your own embodied practice throughout your pregnancy and beyond. Here’s a sample of the program…
Related Article: Preparing to Breathe During Birth: The Ultimate Respiratory Practices for Pregnancy and Labor (Video)
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Author: Ariel Kiley
As someone who has not yet had a child, but is looking forward to having a child, I am so grateful to have come across modalities which feel supportive through such a big life shift. I am so grateful to have this information!
C’est beau de voir qu’il existe des solutions naturelles pour préparer a l’accouchement. Des méthodes naturelles pour vivre une grossesse en conscience.
I wish I would have had the corgeous ball for my pregnancies. I now teach pre and postnatal classes and use them often. It is also great to hear different perspectives from different mothers.
I love to read about the experience of other moms in connection with Yoga Tune Up and especially balls and the ball. I really want to integrate bullet massage into my Prenatal Yoga classes. I’m sure my students will love it! I would have loved to have this knowledge during my 3 pregnancies!
I SO wish I had the Coregeous ball when I was pregnant with my three boys. I actually got a Coregeous ball right after the birth of the third (finally) and all I could do was lay on top of it next to my bed on my yoga mat.. and that was pretty much my only practice for about a year! I just needed to breathe!
Yes!! “There’s no formula for pregnancy” So very true. It is so important to be in tune to your own needs and to be flexible and compassionate with yourself. I knew nothing about Tune Up balls or self massage when I was pregnant many years ago, but believe this would have been a wonderful tool. I found other movement practices that supported me and even day to day things changed. You are your best guru.
I love this! This is going to be essential for the rest of my pregnancy: always be rolling. Thanks for the tips and I really enjoy the different approaches because we’re all so different.
The advice to listen to your body in the moment is such important advice. We are going to experience consistent change, growth, sensation and being in tune to that is helpful in pregnancy and in parenthood. I wish I had the Coregeous and tune-up balls in my pregnancies!
Wow, this is my first reading of a blog during my certification YTU.
Here is a very interesting subject, pregnancy conscious.
I strive every day to promote postural awareness among my pregnant clients. They must take advantage of these moments to take care of them, and pursue this self-awareness after childbirth for better overall health.
My back pain starts with my child birth. I wish I could’ve known this then. Hope I can use this for some of my friends who are expecting.
I felt so much discomfort in my back when pregnant. I didn’t feel comfortable in any position. I couldn’t stand, sit or lie down; everything hurt. I know that YTU would have made a tremendous difference and brought me a ton of relief.
I wish that I could go back in time to my pregancy and practice Yoga Tune Up. I believe it would have made a HUGE difference. I was generally stiff and in pain and so releasing the tension on my shoulders and hips would have been incredible. I so look forward to teaching about using YTU for pregnancy!
Super excited to dive deeper into YTU and how the therapy ball/coregeous ball can create a new set of tools for my clients to use at home while treating pelvic floor dysfunction. As it still seems a very “taboo” topic for many to seek out internal treatment techniques, it is invaluable- the ability to give women and men alike external treatment techniques to mobilize in and around the pelvic floor. A blog post about the most effective ball techniques for pelvic floor dysfuntion/pregnancy would be AWESOME!