After having a baby one of the biggest personal struggles is your body. After 9 months of your body changing it is hard when it doesn’t just snap back the day after giving birth.
Diastatis Recti: the separation of the abdominal muscles , very common postpartum.
With my first pregnancy I could feel a three finger gap in my abdominal muscles. With my second about a 1 1/2 finger gap. Watch this YouTube video to see how to check your abdominal muscles if you aren’t sure.
I gained about half the weight with my second that I did with the first. My first pregnancy took me about 6 months of postpartum workouts to get back to where I felt comfortable with my body again. My body still wasn’t the same but I didn’t expect it to be. My body did an amazing thing to grow a human being and carry him for almost a year. I will welcome the changes with open arms, we all should. Your goals should be to get your body to a place where you feel comfortable, not back to where you were pre-pregnancy.
To get to a comfortable place here is an example of my ease into workouts to help fix the diastatsis recti and loose some belly fat. Combine these with a mix of eating healthy/ nutritionally and breastfeeding (which burns about 500 extra calories a day!) and you are well on your way! What are your favorite postpartum workouts? Let me know in the comments below!
Weeks 0-5
Before you are cleared to work out at your 6 week check up there is one exercise that you can do and should do! WALK!! It helps you heal up faster and can jump start your workouts. Don’t stress your weight during these weeks, but come up with some workout goals of your own. Mine were tighten my stomach, thighs and butt. A silly tip that I read but is a great idea is if you have a two story house keep your changing station on the second floor so you have to keep walking up and down the stairs throughout the day. The last two weeks I did start doing squats and light stretching.
Weeks 6-7
This is the ease into working out phase for me. I wasn’t consistent about working out while pregnant and was on and off about working out pre-pregnancy. If you were good about working out during your pregnancy these workouts are probably laughable to you but for me… they would get me sweating! lol I made a sheet to hang up on my bathroom wall so I could cross of what I did do and circle what I missed. I used this same sheet for 2 weeks.
Weeks 8-12
Still try to fit in my daily walk. Still having my hang up sheet of ab work outs and squats, and now I’m trying to fit in the gym. If you weren’t a big gym goer pre pregnancy then like me it is difficult to find the motivation to go! Start with a small goal like 1 or 2 days a week and work your way up from there.
Weeks 13 and Beyond
My goals for when I get to here will be daily conditioning for my core like my check off lists from pervious weeks and the gym 3-4 times a week. Along with going on walks or hikes on the days I do not go to the gym. This partnered with keeping up my meal planning I hope to get myself back to a comfortable state with my body!
Getting back into working out is tough! Especially with a new little on around. This is no exact guide! I even made this guide for myself and have fallen of the wagon many times! When you fall off just start back at whatever week you feel comfortable at. Add in your own workouts too! and let me know your favorite ones in the comments below!
Good Luck!
