What Muscles are Most Important To Strengthen for a Successful and Natural Childbirth?

In the beginning of your pregnancy, the most important muscles to focus on are your Pelvic Floor Muscles. Strengthening these muscles will stabilize the pelvis, thus helping most postural issues that can cause the most common complaint, lower back pain. I remember when I first heard the words, Pelvic Floor. I literally had no idea what my pilates teacher was talking about until one day she described to me that my Pelvic Floor muscles are my deep abdominal muscles that run like a hammock, supporting the pelvis, attaching from the pubic bone to the tail bone. These muscles are what will help support the uterus during pregnancy and help expel the baby during labor. The more functional the muscle group the better, thus properly training the pelvic floor to relax and strengthen is best.

Once the pelvis is stable, it is important to focus on the other main core muscles. With the challenges of natural postural changes during pregnancy, the weight of the breast enlarging, and a new sense of gravity with baby growing forward, it is important to strengthen the back of the body. The back, specific abdominal muscles, gluts, hips, and hamstrings are all very important to properly tone and stretch. The specific back muscles I'm referring to are the "Lat" muscles. These are the muscles just under your shoulder blade. Believe it or not it runs all the way down to your low back, so strengthening this area can not help your shoulders from rounding, but can also stabilize the upper and lower spine.

The gluts, hip rotators, and hamstrings are also very important to tone and stretch. These muscle groups are very stabilizing for the pelvis for they are the muscles that keep our legs together. Because of the hormone relaxin that is produced during pregnancy, the ligaments holding the pelvis together may be loose or separated. Focusing on these areas can also stabilize the pelvis. It is very important to work the legs together during pregnancy to guarantee a safe position of the pelvis. If you are working one leg at a time, it is important to stabilize one leg as the other one moves. Unfortunately this creates an issue for those of us who like to bike, swim, run, dance, and do aerobics. There are many schools of thought and many doctors do tell their patients that if they were doing the exercise prior to pregnancy than they may continue, however risking the chance of the front of the pelvis becoming loose or separated in my opinion is just not worth it.

As I have stated in previous posts, the abdominals are also an area of the body that needs to be toned and strengthened in a balanced fashion. Over working the abdominals while pregnant is just not smart. Finding a balance between stretch and toning the abdominals is the best way to keep the integrity of the abdominal muscles without creating imbalances in the body. Also, doing abdominal crunches in the traditional format while lying on your back is equally not worth the risk. More and more women today risk the chance of developing a diastasis-recti which is a splitting or parting of the recti muscles.

When I originally learned this material I thought to myself "if only more women knew this information prior to getting pregnant, a lot of misfortune during childbirth could possibly be prevented!" So, this is why I continue to keep writing, keep learning, and reach out to the mommies out there!

C-section, I had no idea!

Did you know that in the United States, 1 in 4 births are C-section! When I first heard this statistic, it was VERY alarming to me. Even more alarming is the fact that over 1/3 of C-sections are repeat C-section in the US. With this said, understanding the most safe, effective way to rehab and care for yourself after major abdominal surgery is critical! Most C-section mothers are sent home with very simple instructions: don't drive, don't walk up stairs, and take it easy for at least 2 wks- BUT what they are not told is that once cleared by a doctor there are ways to safely regain their core strength before returning to any sort of exercise routine- in some cases even as soon as one week. Since C-section is considered major abdominal surgery it should be treated as another other surgery- with proper rehabilitation.

Every woman's healing time is different. The recovery time from a C-section can vary from woman to woman. Some women may feel up to beginning simple rehab exercises after just one week and some may be longer, but not doing any kind of rehab for the abdominals can effect a woman's body forever. Incontinence of the bladder, diastasis-recti, back pain, bowel issues, digestive issues can all come from major abdominal surgery. With proper strengthening of these muscles can help all of these problems.

Gentle exercises starting with simple breathing up toward the rib cage and eventually heading down toward the incision may be all that is tolerable for the first, possibly second week. When the mother is ready, a few coughs can be very effective to help activate the pelvic floor. This can all be done while lying in bed. With a pre and post pregnancy pilates specialist or physical therapist, the mother can soon begin very simple pelvic stabilization exercises that will help activate the pelvic floor. All of these exercises are done lying supine. There should also be communication between instructor and mother to how quickly she will progress onto the stability work.

Once again, education is the key to the future of women's health. We can learn from our mother's, our sisters, friends, and educators now that the information is out there. It is just up to us to plug in! How exciting that there are answers to our questions and we're not alone when we need help the most!