What you need to know about postpartum exercise
One of the first questions that new mothers ask is how soon after having their baby, they can start working out and start working to get their old figure and their old physical fitness back!
The initial answer to how soon after a baby you should start working out is pretty simple: it depends on the situation of each individual person.
Talk to your doctor about when he or she thinks that you are ready to begin exercising again. Your doctor can also give you ideas on what types of exercises you can do at different times-gentler exercises when you first start exercising after giving birth and then working up to more rigorous exercises. Along with talking to your doctor, you also need to listen to your body. If you begin postpartum exercise and your body protests and it hurts too much, then you should stop exercising and wait until your body has healed a little bit more.
Walking
The first postpartum exercise that you should begin after giving birth is walking. You can begin walking soon after giving birth to your child. Just take even 15 or 30 minutes to walk each day. You can ask your husband, a friend, or a family member to watch your baby for a little while so that you can get some good exercise, some fresh air, and some much-needed time for yourself.
When your baby becomes older, take your baby on walks with you. Choose a pram that will make walking easy and that you don’t have to work too hard to push, and start walking! Your baby will benefit from the fresh air, and as long as the weather is good, you can both enjoy getting out of the house. You can also use a baby carrier if you prefer to carry your baby rather than use a pram.
When it comes to exercise other than gentle walking, the following guidelines are generally considered to be a good idea to follow.
Start just by working out for about 30 minutes for each session. Do this three times a week.
Rather than working out at the same level of intensity as you did before you became pregnant, strive to reach a level of workout intensity that is about half of your pre-pregnancy exercise regime.
Gradually, rather than rapidly, build up the frequency and intensity of your workouts. Listen to your body; it will tell you if you are doing too much and if you need to cut down a little bit.
Baby carrying exercises
There are lots of classes that now offer Mum and Baby exercise classes. Some are more for the Mum and babies lie down watching the Mum exercise over them. Others are for doing whilst wearing the baby in a carrier. If you wanted to try it at home, you could try a BabaBoogie DVD.
The following exercises will help you strengthen muscles and areas of your body that were weakened by both your pregnancy and the actual birth process. Adding these exercises to your workout regime will greatly help out your postpartum recovery.
Kegel exercises
Kegel exercises strengthen your pelvic muscles and the muscles of your birth canal. Doing Kegels is especially important because these exercises will help you strengthen your abdomen muscles so that your uterus and your bladder don’t fall. Kegels will help tighten up and strengthen muscles that were weakened during your pregnancy and especially stretched during birth.
Sit on a hair, flat chair. Balance your weight on your sit bones. Sit up straight. Now squeeze the muscles that can be squeezed to stop urination. Hold these muscles and lift them, hold them for ten seconds, and then relax. Begin with just five reps, and then work your way up to sets of 10, done three times a day.
C-Curves
C-Curves will help develop your abdomen muscles and will also help strengthen your lower back in order to ease lower back pain.