to go for help:
The National Childbirth Trust offers help and advice on ‘pelvic disfunctions’ like SPD. 0870 770 3236 www.spd-uk.org
Reasons to exercise
Exercise that makes you warm and slightly out of breath is good for most pregnant women. It can strengthen your bones, give you more energy and help you sleep better.
A basic level of fitness can help you cope with the marathon of childbirth.
Exercise can keep you flexible, reduce aches and pains and help other pregnancy symptoms like constipation.
Exercise can help lower your stress levels and lift your mood.
What types of exercise are good?
Low impact exercise, like walking (30–40 minutes, three times a week), yoga (an antenatal class) or swimming (aquanatal classes are good) are all generally safe to do, no matter how unfit you are in everyday life. If you’ve exercised or done certain sports before this pregnancy you should be able to keep going – if it feels good – but DO take the intensity down a notch and again, do set some reasonable parameters with your doctor. Avoid any exercise that is too jerky or has violent impact – such as high-impact aerobics – as this is more likely to strain you.
‘I did spinning up until the last week of my pregnancy,’ says Tiffany Lipelt, a certified health and fitness instructor with a BA in exercise physiology who is also a mother of two children under five, a long distance runner and yoga addict. ‘I have had pregnant women in Tae-bo classes and lifting weights (all have to be modified eventually). It is important to keep your doctor updated and to know that it is not a “results-oriented” work out. It is just to keep you healthy and your mind clear as you get bigger and bigger. Your body and your baby will be your guide – if it doesn’t feel good, it isn’t! It is important to follow basic safety advice, but it is also important to remember that you are an individual and that if you work with your doctor you can come up with a middle ground that suits your exercise needs.’
PELVIC FLOOR EXERCISE | This is one kind of exercise even couch potatoes can excel at. The pelvic floor is the cradle of muscles that keep your bladder and womb in the right place. Pregnancy stretches them. You may leak urine if they are weakened (see Incontinence). What to do: Stopping the flow of urine half way through peeing – or trying to – will help you work out what a pelvic floor exercise feels like. People will tell you different ‘numbers’ of exercises you should do, and it can get confusing. Just do some, as often as you can (about ten times a day is good).
Regularly during your day (at traffic lights, when washing up, waiting to cross the road etc.), tighten your pelvic floor, tighten some more, and then some more, as if going three floors up in a lift. Hold five seconds. Release in the same way. Repeat a few times.
Then do a squeeze, hold for a second, and release. Repeat this a few times (well, about ten times would be ideal).
At first this can be frustrating. You may feel you can’t even find the muscles, let alone twitch them. Don’t give up. Practise. Benefits include your long-term gynaecological health, improved sex life, protection against incontinence and, some say, a strong pelvic floor even helps you push the baby out.
General exercise safety rules
1 Do not start anything new (except antenatal classes). If you begin a sudden dramatic increase in your exercise routine on discovering you’re pregnant, or start a new sport hoping to stave off the weight gain, it’s possible you might harm your baby or yourself.
2 Talk to your doctor about any specific sports you do. If your temperature gets too high this can – theoretically – pose risks to the baby as its heart rate will speed up. The best way to gauge how hot is too hot, is to talk to your doctor about how high you should allow your heart rate to go when exercising. Get a heart-rate monitor and use it whenever you are exercising, to keep your heart rate at a level you have agreed with your doctor.
3 Avoid exercises on your back (e.g. sit ups) after 12 weeks. When you are on your back, the weight of the baby sits on the main blood supply from your legs to your heart. This can restrict the oxygen supply to the baby, whose heart rate could then become depressed.
4 Modify your current fitness plan as your girth increases. As your pregnancy progresses, you’ll reach your maximum heart rate faster and your centre of gravity will change. Don’t abandon your workout entirely (a recumbent bike or treadmill might replace an aerobics class for instance). And try not to be results oriented – remember you are not trying to achieve anything (except basic well-being) during pregnancy.
5 Drink water. Most pregnant women don’t drink enough anyway and exercise makes this worse. Dehydration can lead to blood clots, and can also restrict the oxygen supply to your baby.
6 Use common sense. Some contact sports carry certain relatively minor risks. A severe blow to the abdomen, while unlikely, could damage the baby or cause you to miscarry. Ask your doctor if you are uncertain about the advisability of your chosen sport.
7 Listen to your body. If you have aches and pains, modify what you’re doing quickly or stop and try something else.
Reasons to be extra cautious
A history of miscarriage – particularly in the second trimester – certain conditions like ‘placenta praevia’, where the placenta is over the neck of the womb, or an ‘incompetent cervix’, where the neck of the womb is weak, can all be reasons to be cautious. If your baby is not growing well, or if you are carrying twins (or more) you may also need to take it slow. As always, talk to your midwife or doctor if there are any concerns.
Danger signs: Stop, and tell your midwife or doctor if you have any unexplained bleeding, dizziness, heart palpitations, blurred vision, sharp pains in abdomen or chest, or contractions during exercise.
Impact tip:
If you’re exercising at home (to a video, say) do so on a relatively soft surface, such as a yoga mat, to minimize the impact on your joints.
Falling down/being bumped in the belly: almost always the baby is fine when this happens. If, however, you feel the baby is moving less, or you are worried about pain or concussion, call your doctor/midwife.
PREGNANCY FITNESS
Specific forms of exercise
If you’re doing a specific form of exercise already, it may be perfectly safe to continue though modifying it as the pregnancy progresses. But always discuss your exercise routine with your doctor as your pregnancy may have issues of its own that rule some things out.
Spinning This can be great, but as your pregnancy progresses move from standing to sitting and don’t crank up the knob up as much as you did. Talk to your doctor about maximum heart rates.
Running Follow rules on intensity, watch the surface you are running on (not too hard or uneven) and beware your changing
