Welcoming a baby into your life is a joyous and transformative experience, but it also comes with its own set of challenges. For many new moms, one of the most daunting and confusing aspects of postpartum life can be finding their way back to fitness. Your body has just gone through significant changes. Giving it the time it needs to heal coupled with patience and intention, is vital for the recovery process. If you’re a mom, and looking to regain your strength and energy, this guide from Divine Mama Strength is for you.
1. Understand How to ‘Listen to Your Body’
Before jumping back into any fitness routine, it’s important to get in touch with your body postpartum. Each mom’s recovery is unique, so it is not a one-size fits all approach. Pay attention to how you feel both physically and emotionally every day. If you experience pain or something ‘just doesn’t feel right’, it might be a sign that you need to slow down. There is a difference between feeling sore and feeling pain, so it’s important to understand the distinction between the two.
Fun Fact: Pushing through the pain is not a good idea when you are in postpartum recovery because it can cause existing issues to intensify and new ones to appear.
2. Start Slow and Focus on Foundational Movements
Breathing exercises are key to a successful postpartum recovery (think diaphragmatic breathing). Retraining your body to do full belly expansion and not to “suck it in”, is pivotal to the postpartum recovery process. Squatting, stretching your hips out and carrying dumbbells or kettlebells are a good starting point to retrain your body to move with intention. As you build strength and range of motion, you can gradually introduce more challenging workouts.
Fun Fact: Many postpartum women have a hard time adjusting to the sudden disappearance of their pregnancy belly, and need posture and movement pattern adjustments.
3. Incorporate Core and Pelvic Floor Exercises
During pregnancy, your core and pelvic floor muscles undergo significant changes. To help with postpartum recovery, focus on exercises that strengthen these areas (not just Kegels). Including exercises like dead bugs, bird dogs, and learning how to brace your abdominal muscles are incredibly important to your recovery. Improving the strength in your core will also help to close the gap you may have from diastasis recti (coning of the belly), and help resolve any leaking you may have. Incidentally, it is never too late to resolve your diastasis recti separation.
Fun Fact: Your core extends from the front of your body all the way around to your back, with the pelvic floor making up one portion of it.
4. Set Functional Goals For Yourself
Getting out of bed without struggle or bending over without back pain are a couple of examples of functional goals that directly impact your day to day life. Please don’t focus on rapid weight loss or lifting a substantial amount of weight the first 6 months to a year postpartum. Just because you can do something, doesn’t mean you should. Your primary goal should be to feel strong and capable so you can take care of your new baby and yourself in the best possible way.
Fun Fact: Most women don’t feel like themselves again for 1-5 years depending on their postpartum journey.
5. Find Your Tribe of Supportive and Trusted Partners
The postpartum journey is an emotional rollercoaster, so making sure you have the right support system by your side can make a significant difference in your recovery. Connect with other moms with similar mindsets who are also focusing on postpartum recovery and who may be going through similar things as you.
Fun Fact: As a certified prenatal and postpartum health and wellness coach, Divine Mama Strength is trusted by many Austin women, and will be a life-long member of your tribe.
Postpartum Is Forever
It’s easy for someone to tell you to just embrace your postpartum journey, but the reality is it’s not so simple for some of us. Getting back into fitness after having a baby is a journey that requires patience, self-compassion, and in many cases, time. Once you go through a pregnancy, you are postpartum forever. Your body will never forget that period of time, and as such you are never too postpartum to start recovering. At Divine Mama Strength, we have women that range from 8 weeks postpartum to 37 years. You and you alone will know when the time is right to start focusing on your postpartum recovery journey.
And when you are ready, Divine Mama Strength is here for you. Each program is designed to support your body’s recovery while helping you obtain strength and stability, no matter your fitness level or age. And you will have a cheerleader to help celebrate your progress along the way.
If you’re ready to start your postpartum fitness journey or looking for guidance and support, reach out today. There are also monthly prenatal and postpartum virtual workshops that are designed to provide deeper guidance and answer any big questions you may have.
Remember, you are not alone in your postpartum journey mama.
