Yoga bears health benefits for both people wanting to get in tune with their overall wellness and those who are pregnant, with many pregnant women finding relief with prenatal yoga that is giving them healthy and fit pregnancies.

As an expecting mother, you’re reading all the pregnancy books and articles and always trying to figure out just one more way to make your pregnancy better for you and the one that’s growing inside. Find a healthier, fit pregnancy with prenatal yoga with us at Every Body Balance and read more how prenatal yoga can give you the fit pregnancy you’ve always wanted!

Prenatal Yoga For A Healthy And Fit Pregnancy

Because yoga supports the expecting mother.

With so many prenatal health and wellness practices out there, yoga is a gentle way to keep your body healthy during your pregnancy and prepare it for birth.

Breathwork

How we breathe and when we breathe really isn’t a thing in our everyday lives, after all, it’s something we do autonomically, but learning breathwork is a major part of the labor process. Proper breathing helps to relax the body and take your mind from the pain on labor. In yoga, this breathwork is called “pranayama” and it’s what yogis impart to still the mind. In our prenatal yoga classes, you’ll learn to breathe from the belly in the three-part breath known as “ujjayi.”

Strengthen Your Pelvic Floor

The pelvic floor isn’t talked about as commonly as it should, as it’s a vital piece to women’s and men’s sexual health. In pregnancy, it’s important to support the pelvic floor and make it as strong as possible before you give birth. Pregnancy can weaken the pelvic floor because of the increased weight and shifting of your bones and muscles to accommodate the baby. When you work on your pelvic floor, it not only helps keep you healthy after the birth, but it supplies much needed blood circulation that assists in postnatal recovery. Some simple prenatal flows that address the pelvic floor are a seated forward fold, cat/cow, downward dog, and chaturanga.

Relieve Your Feet

While yoga is great for addressing lower back pain, what is often skipped over are the benefits it has on the feet. Your feet carry the load of the pregnancy and are extremely complex structures with 26 bones, over 100 muscles, and 33 joints — it’s important to give them support, too! In pregnancy, everything shifts — your center of gravity, muscles, and bones — and for the feet this means over-pronation and swelling, resulting in pain of the heel, ball, or arch or the foot. Prenatal yoga is great for alleviating the pressure and incorporating poses that elevate your feet. It also drives circulation to reduce swelling in your ankles and feet.  

Support Your Hips

Pregnancy takes it toll on the hips, and yoga is the perfect exercise for bringing back mobility and flexibility that can assist the hormones that relax and mellow the hips to help prepare them for birth. Yoga effectively helps stretch the ligaments in the pelvis, leg, and hip areas to help make childbirth more comfortable and pushing easier.

Gain Better Posture

As your belly begins to grow, your body adds additional weight to support the pregnancy, which can negatively impact your posture. It’s important that you can learn to balance your center of gravity that supports your lower back and abdominal muscles. Major core work is recommended in pregnancy to accommodate the extra weight and in keeping your body in an upright position. Prenatal has wonderful core exercises that support your abdominal region, thus promoting proper posture. Cat/cow is commonly implemented into our prenatal yoga classes.

Calm Your Whole Body

Sometimes in pregnancy, you just need to calm everything down. Prenatal yoga classes are gentle and allow you to just relax and stay in savasana (corpse pose) if you need. This can help relax your body and help connect you to your child.

Prenatal yoga is beneficial for every part of your body — from your pelvic floor to your feet. For a fit pregnancy that helps prepare you for labor, try a prenatal yoga class today!

At Every Body Balance, you’ll not only experience improved flexibility and build muscular strength, you’ll find a community of maternal wisdom to guide you through each transition of pregnancy. Schedule a class today!