Pregancy Yoga: connect with your mind, body and baby

Now coming to the end of my second trimester, I am entering a bloom (which is late, but that’s me!) however, with the foetus growing and my body expanding, I’ve started to feel more physical discomfort. This is not uncommon in pregnancy, so it‘s best to be proactive and find ways to cope. After a little success with a pregnancy yoga DVD during my first pregnancy, I opted to take it one step further and seek out some teachers for advice.

Yoga can be a bit baffling, distinguishing between all the different disciplines. I worked with Susie Larcombe who practices pregnancy yoga, mainly based on Hatha poses and Morgan Nichols (Khalsa Kaur) who instructed me in Kundalini yoga. Morgan explains in a nutshell what the Kundalini discipline is about “(It’s) a form of yoga that uses dynamic movement, mantra (sound currents for healing), mudras (hand postures) and pranayama (breathwork), as well as meditation, all in combination to bring about balance and healing in the body, mind and spirit.”. Hatha yoga is probably the most common form practiced today and focuses on physical postures, purification procedures, poses, breathing and meditation. Susie trained in Canada then went on to train specifically in pregnancy with Uma Dinsmore-Tuli, a renowned pioneer of pregnancy yoga practice and teaching. As part of the training she had to learn about pregnancy from a fairly medical and anatomical point of view and having not had kids herself, it was overwhelming but completely fascinating for her.

I sought out Morgan during my first trimester to help with nausea, stress and sleep deprivation. After seeing one of her workshops for personal renewal of mind, body and spirit advertised, we discussed my needs for a bespoke session. Not only did she guide me in my poses but left me with a sheet of instructions so I could practice them when I wanted. Our session took place in our lounge, we have just enough room for the stretches. Morgan set the ambiance with specific music to accompany each section of the session, from peaceful instrumental meditation pieces through to vocal songs, almost like hymns. What I liked the most was each move or meditation was focussed on a particular purpose, cat-cow stretches to cast out doubt, rest & relax in baby pose which can release gas and relax the area around the heart plus my personal favourite alternative nostril breathing for relaxing your body’s energy.

By the time I had my Hatha-based session with Susie, I was experiencing much more physical discomfort as the baby grew bigger inside me and my joints were loosening to prepare for this expansion. As my usual aerobic exercise routine had gone out of the window, my pelvic floor was lazy and out of control. I suddenly found I was dashing for the loo at home and ‘not making it in time’ having nearly as many accidents as my toddler in potty training. Sitting at a desk all day at work and forgetting to move around meant I started to suffer from lower back pain and as my uterus was expanding, I was feeling the first rumblings of sciatica. We worked through some gentle but powerful stretches on the calve, gluteal and quad muscles as well as some tame but effective balance poses for general core stability. Susie’s group classes at Yoga Haven in Hove are usually 90 minutes long which allows for a full 20 minute relaxation session, the most illuminating part of our one to one. I never knew it was possible to relax so many intricate parts of your body, Susie is soothingly talking me through the exercise and just when I think it’s not possible to relax any other muscle she instructs me to release all the tension in my ears - how did she know they were tense.

The exercises and poses both teachers took me through were not high impact as some people expect yoga to be but it was evident days after the benefits I gained. I strongly believe the combination of the physical poses and meditation conditions your posture and helps control the pains as it expands to accommodate your baby. The key tool I learned from both sessions was relaxation. Once you start to let go of different parts of the body, you realise how tense other areas are. In fact being aware of every inch of my body was incredibly intense, I had truly never been that connected with my physical being nor the child growing inside me. During pregnancy, we tend to tense our key joints as some sort of protection mechanism against falling over and harming ourselves and our offspring. The more you put strain on the those areas of your body, the tightness spreads further as other areas over compensate for your tired, overused points such as the lower back, shoulders and neck. The relaxation exercises train you to let go and truly rest plus your brain is concentrated highly on releasing this tenseness, you don’t have the chance to think about anything else, so becomes a great stress reliever in the process.

Both Morgan and Susie offer one to one classes but you could also organise sessions with a couple of ante-natal buddies in your own home to share the costs (there would need to ample space). There’s also many centres offering ante and post-natal across in most communities around the city and the rest of the county. Susie says that many of her regular class goers bond in the same way as NCT ante-natal groups, as many are due at similar times, it’s a great way to find likeminded new mum friends.

For more information on Kundalini or pregnancy yoga try: www.kundaliniyogasussex.com www.susieyoga.com www.yogahaven.co.uk/brighton

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