If you have a strong, engaged, activated core unit (I’m talking transverse abdominus, diaphram and pelvic floor) you most likely will NOT show easily or quickly (unless you have a special condition happening like a tilted uterus for example). Your core is strong enough to hold the baby in tight and your tummy will resist being pushed out by your uterus for longer into your pregnancy and you are much less likely to get “Big Belly Syndrome” later in your pregnancy. Which is huge!! I was hell-bent on making SURE my core was super strong to avoid Big Belly Syndrome and diastasis as well.
Check this excerpt from Fit For Birth (who I became pre and post natal certified with) about belly size during pregnancy.
Activated Core VS De-activated Core:
“Quite amazingly in Fit For Birth’s experience has been the witnessing of “big belly syndrome” literally disappearing once a pregnant woman learns how to belly pump effectively. Take a look at Figure 4 below. The left shows Gabriela during her second pregnancy at 6 months before she has been taught to use her belly pump. This was taken before training with Fit For Birth. The photo on the right shows Gabriela during her third pregnancy at nearly nine months, but with a smaller tummy! She spent her third pregnancy learning how to use her belly pump effectively.
Figure 4 shows the usual big belly at 6 months (left), but then a much more manageable belly at nearly full term when strengthening the core through belly training (right).”
Big Belly Syndrome is exactly what it sounds like. Your stomach gets big, really big and stretched, and the bigger it gets the more uncomfortable you are (hello back pain) and harder it is to bounce back post baby and the easier it becomes for your abs to split (diastasis). This is motivation for me to not be caught up with wanting my belly to pop out so soon into my pregnancy. I focused very specifically on strengthening my core for the past year or so before getting pregnant because through researching and learning more and more about pre natal training I realized just how insanely important this is and how much better off you will be if you go INTO your pregnancy with a strong and activated core.
This doesn’t mean doing 1000 crunches a day either. It’s about strengthening your back, legs, core, abs, pelvic floor and diaphram. There are a few amazing ways to do this that don’t consist of laying on your back and crunching up (so little value comes out of this pregnant or not). Here are some of the BEST exercises to work on your core and getting your TVA working and engaged.
#1 LIFT LEGS!!
Lifting legs with medium to heavy weight is one of the BEST ways to work your core and get your transverse abdominis working and TVA strength is SOOOOOO important!! The TVA or transverse abdomminis is the deepest ab muscle that we have. The TVA is the innermost layer of all abdominal muscles located behind the quote, unquote ‘6 pack abs’. Think of this muscle as your body’s natural corset and support system. If your TVA is not engaged, not activated and not working on the regular basis you are at risk of injury, you are setting yourself up to potentially have big belly syndrome when pregnant and you will NEVER be able to achieve flat tight abs without having a frustrating pouch that sticks out under your belly button… so many women have come to me saying that their stomach is coming together but they just can’t get rid of the lower pouch, well this is exactly what is causing it.
This is where the legs come in! You are FORCED to engage your core and TVA while squatting and lunging for example. If you didn’t engage your core throughout these exercises you would properly fall over! Your core balances you and you MUST balance to properly perform these exercises. Building and strengthening your TVA is ESSENTIAL to do before, during and after pregnancy. This is the muscle that will prevent you from getting big belly syndrome and will help you be so much more comfortable for so much longer into your pregnancy, not to mention this muscle will help out BIG time during your labor and helping your core shrink back quickly after your deliver. This muscle is also to thank for keeping you from showing early in your pregnancy.
Your legs are the biggest and strongest muscles in your body, so don’t be afraid to pick up challenging dumbbells during your leg workout! If you are pregnant and usually use 8 pound dumbbells this doesn’t mean to go into the gym and grab 25 lbs dumbbells, but there is nothing wrong with bumping up to the next size dumbbells if you are still able to maintain proper form and feel comfortable. When I do a HIIT style leg workout, I use 25-35 LBS dumbbells. This equals half to a little more than half of my body weight, and for me that’s my normal and there is nothing wrong with maintaining your normal throughout pregnancy. Don’t be scared to pick up weights that continue to challenge you, don’t be scared to complete a workout that FEELS like a workout, not a warm up! Let’s take the FEAR out of working out during pregnancy. “Exercise does not cause miscarriages. Exercise does not cause pre-term labor.” That is a direct quote from my OBGYN doctor and of studies that are published on PUBMED. This is not my opinion, these are proven facts studied by researchers and doctors.
#2 BREATHING!
Ahhhhh seems so simple, yet most of the population, women and men, pregnant or not don’t know how to breath properly anymore. Let’s start by taking a big deep breath in. Lets do this now. Ok- take notice what just happened with your upper body when you took that breath. Did your chest expanded and your shoulder rise up? If this the case then you actually aren’t breathing correctly… and you’re not alone. Most people actually do not breathe correctly these days. The issue is that people aren’t using our diaphragms to breathe.
Lets put both hands on your belly now. While you read on about this very important muscle go ahead and practice taking big deep breaths in and out using that diaphragm to do so. When you inhale try to fill your belly into your hands as you expand your diaphragm with oxygen, we want to fill your belly, your sides and your lower back with air. When you exhale try to draw your belly button into your spine, thinking about hugging your baby with your belly as you do this… we want to rid all the stale air out of your body during your exhale.
The diaphragm is the primary respiratory muscle which attaches to the lungs and when used properly will pull the lungs open and increase the space in the chest cavity. Proper movement of the diaphragm will effect simulation of every function in the entire musculoskeletal system (which helps provide form, support, stability, and movement to the body), hormonal system, central nervous system and gastrointestinal system.
Unfortunately, any kind of mental, emotional or physical stress can inhibit the diaphragm from functioning in its fluid rhythmic ways. This is another reason to add exercise into your routine during pregnancy, to help reduce stress and increase those feel good hormones we get from working out, because remember, ANY emotion or hormone that we feel, the baby will also feel. Really!
Start implementing diaphramtic breathing into your daily routine and throughout every single exercise in your workouts. The more you practice the more your body will get back into natural routine and your body will start doing this without you even having to think about it!
#3 PELVIC FLOOR ACTIVATION & STRENGTH
This is a super important and a lot of times forgotten muscle that acts as a sling, holding and supporting your bladder, uterus or womb, and bowel. Your Pelvic floor stretches from your pubic bone to the base of your spine. It is so important to know what this muscle is and to exercise it before, during, and after pregnancy.
Lets contract your Pelvic Floor now by imagining that you are trying to hold in urine. Some women will feel this contraction more in the front and some in the back, you just want to make sure you are not just contracting your glutes but actually under your glutes, where your lady parts are. I always say if when you contract these muscles and it starts to feel kinda good, than you are doing it correctly. You want to make sure that you are continuing to breathe as you contract these muscles and you don’t hold your breathe. So as I go over some Pelvic Floor basics I want you to continue to contract your pevlic floor, hold for a count of 5 then release and repeat.
Your pelic floor goes under a lot of stress during pregnancy which is one of the reasons we need to acknowledge and strengthen it along the way. You PF can become stretched out and start losing function just 12 weeks into your pregnancy, so doing these exercises from the start is super important.
So how often should we be doing these types of exercises? To be honest, if you have a weak pevlic floor such as you have trouble holding your urine when you workout, sneeze, cough ect would say implement them more until you see an improvement. Generally speaking I would recommend these every single day, if possible twice a day. Ugh i know so annoying. But if you can just implement the exercises we went over and you are doing right now maybe in the car on the way to work and on the way home from work, or on the way to the gym, or while you’re running errands this can seriously improve your pelvic floor strength which is going to help you during pregnancy, during delivery and post pregnancy. Pelvis floor exercises are SOOOO boring! Ugh, I hate doing it! So I started implemented these exercised into my workouts. I add them into my squats (when I get to the bottom of top of range of motion I squeeze and hold my PF). I also do this with plank variations or during my walking or jogging recoveries during my HIIT cardio training.
These three things will help you have a more comfortable pregnancy, will help make your delivery faster and easier and will help your body bounce back faster post labor. It sounds like a WIN WIN to me 🙂
For those who want to work core during pregnancy, but aren’t sure how, or what is safe, check out my new Pre-natal Core Workout that is safe to do through all trimesters! The full workout can be downloaded from the FREE Pear Sports Training App, which you can find in your App Store or Google Play Store. Enjoy!
The Fit Life...Knocked up! 