Thoughts on prenatal fitness + the most basic shit you need for parenting a newborn.
I’m writing this on my son Beau’s first birthday. It’s astonishing to believe I’ve had an actual real person in my charge for an entire year, but it’s true, folks! And he’s doing wonderfully from all assessments. Score! Healthy, happy, and trying to throw my fancy products in the toilet on a daily basis (that’s why I finally installed the child-proof toilet thing last night at 11pm. #denied).
In honor of this milestone, I thought I’d write a short reflection on two things (I hope this is short bc I still need to bake a smash cake. What’s a smash cake? Don’t worry about it unless you have a child under the age of 1):
If you’re like me when I was pregnant, perhaps you just want someone to break shit down for you so you don’t have to spend your entire life pouring over pregnancy books and blogs trying to figure out the essentials for parenting a newborn in terms of gear, i.e., what do you really need to spend money on/clutter your house with? If you prefer a less is more approach like I do, you might be wondering do I really need to waste my precious registry space on a baby bathrobe? Answer: That’ll be hard no.
As a chronic procrastinator who had pretty much NOTHING ready for my child when he was born (fact: I frantically set up the nursery the day before my in-laws came for a month-long visit when Beau was 4-weeks old), I decided I’m not doing this having-a-baby-blindly thing EVER. AGAIN. I kept a record of everything I *really, actually* needed in spreadsheet form so I will remember next time. In the past year, I’ve shared this spreadsheet with a few friends and they’ve shared it with their friends, and now, dear reader, I’m sharing it with you. It’s exactly what I wish I had access to when I was trying to navigate a baby registry, figure out what to pack in an overnight delivery bag, and stock a changing table.
My thoughts on prenatal fitness plus a couple of essential tips that saved me during my pregnancy. All right, that smash cake is calling my name, so without further ado: here’s the spreadsheet.
Feel free to share it, and remember, this is only meant to help, not be the definitive Meegan version of Dr. Sears’ Baby Book or whatever. Use what makes sense and discard the rest, just like a BBP class!
Onto the prenatal fitness.
The first thing I think is worth mentioning is a nuanced point: I don't recommend taking on other peoples’ stories about pregnancy. What I mean by that is that we often get what we expect—the brain is a powerful creator and the power of suggestion is real—so just because you hear about a myriad of ailments from “mommy brain” to heartburn to feeling emotionally heightened, that does NOT mean you’ll experience those things. There were so many aspects of the commonly-touted pregnancy narrative that I didn’t find to be true at all. Just keep an open mind, don’t attach to an outcome, and deal with things as they come (and if you somehow evade constipation, you’re a better woman than I am. P.s. I’m giving you the cure below).
Regarding your fitness approach: First of all, this is entirely personal preference in tandem with what your midwife or doctor recommends. Remember that you know your body best so you know what you need and the habits you’ve established before your pregnancy in terms of fitness are the best indicators of what you can do during pregnancy. My midwife recommended a workout that seemed like it was for people who had never exercised a day in their lives so I just smiled and nodded and continued to do my own thing (for the record, my actual doctor is a BBP client and she said I could do class as long as I felt like it, which turned out to be until about 5 days before Beau was born. Shoutout to Dr. Waite!).
For my workouts, I focused on continuing to strengthen my posterior chain—my butt, hamstrings, back, and shoulder muscles—while giving my abs an almost complete rest beginning at 5 months pregnant through 7 weeks postpartum. Why? Because I felt that my abs were too tight and I could feel them stretching apart. I didn’t want to continue strengthening/tightening them. I wanted them to soften in order to make space for my baby and also, I hoped this would prevent abdominal separation, which I believe it did. My midwife and pelvic floor therapist confirmed that I had zero postpartum separation of the linea alba after Beau was born which is very rare. Again, personal preference here so do what you’re feeling called to, but if ever there was a good time to chill on the ab work, it’s pregnancy.
In addition to really focusing on strengthening my backbody, I also focused on building arm strength (which suddenly and completely disappeared at the very beginning of my pregnancy) AND dedicated time to chest opening postures and stretches. This will really come in handy once your baby is born because breast feeding and holding a little person in front of you all day long puts you in really weird positions you have never assumed in your entire life.
With that said, here are a few things that might be useful for you, in no particular order:
Working out can feel way harder when you’re pregnant. Your body is almost doubling its blood supply and you have to pump all of that extra blood through your heart which can make you feel easily out-of-breath. This is how I realized I was pregnant in the first place. I felt winded out of nowhere just walking up the stairs. Be patient with yourself, remember this is temporary, and continue moving through it.
At around 26 weeks, I totally lost my energy. Workouts were miz. (When I filmed the 28 week prenatal workout, my producer Evan said I needed to do more of the class, but I just had nothing left). At 32 weeks though, I bounced back and had great energy for the entire remaining duration. I’ve heard this to be true for many women, but again, just listen to your body.
If you’ve had a regular jumping or running practice, etc., you can continue to do those things. For the safety of your baby, it’s not advisable to start a jumping practice or pick up running if you don’t have the stability in your pelvis at the start of your pregnancy. For BBP and our prenatal workouts, we’ve added some jumping to the earlier workouts (18-24 weeks). Feel free to jump if you’ve been a client of ours prior to your pregnancy. Also feel free to ditch the jumping all together and just modify however you see fit. The later workouts are jump-free. Further, our Groundwork class is another jump-free option (just skip the ab work).
The relaxin hormone that helps your pelvis loosen so you can push a live human out of your body affects all of your tendons and ligaments, not just those in your hips. It’s super important for your body’s stability to NOT overstretch. Once you overstretch your tendons and ligaments, they don’t necessarily bounce back and, in fact may be permanently stretched so be cognizant of your set-point flexibility before pregnancy and try not go beyond it.
Last, these were the absolute holy grails for me during my pregnancy:
A foam roller (see my foam rolling post for details!)
Magnesium citrate powder: Like I mentioned, maybe you won’t experience constipation and good for you if so, but this stuff is priceless and will CURE YOU in case you do. You can safely take up to 1000mg a night before bed mixed with water. Bonus: it will help you sleep and dream like crazy AND is supposed to help with the spontaneous leg cramps that absolutely destroyed me at night. (Get the powder, not the capsules. Trust me.) I got mine at Pharmaca but you could also order it online.
This pregnancy pillow that I found recommended in the NYT’s wirecutter. It’s totally bizarre but you’ll sleep super comfortably.
My labor mantra: “You’re a badass bitch. You’re a badass bitch. You’re a badass bitch.” (Thank you to my rad client Anna who told me she used that during her delivery. It works. As much as anything external can actually work, of course.)
Get yourself a pelvic floor therapist once you’re at 12 weeks postpartum. Do it. This is standard practice in France, paid for by the government. Can’t recommend it highly enough. (I’ll do a postnatal fitness post at a later date so stay tuned for that!)
I’ll wrap this up with these final thoughts.
Childbirth is BADASS (see my mantra above). I’ve never been so proud of myself in my entire life. I think about the birth of my son often and it truly changed my perspective on what I’m capable of. Even though it was awful, it was also awesome. Our BBP prenatal classes are designed to get you prepped for delivery and beyond through focused backbody strengthening, pelvic stablization, and primal mobility (how your body is intended to move!). They’re not for everyone, but if you’re looking for something a little more intense than you’re average maternity workout, try us out! We’ve got a free seven day trial and you can cancel anytime.
Questions or comments? Holler at me, babes! You can reach me at meegan@backbodyproject.com or comment below.
-Meegan