How Soon After Birth Can You Begin Exercising

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I often have moms come to me after birth who want to know how soon they can begin working out again and return to their normal routine. Most times, their body may not be ready for strenuous activity in the weeks following the birth, however, they can start some basic exercise movements that start reactivating their pelvic floor and abdominal muscles. How soon one can start creating these movements really depends on the type of delivery you’ve had. If you had a uncomplicated vaginal delivery, then you can start these exercises within 12 hours of giving birth. However, if you had a C-section or a complicated birth or even a hard birth then you might want to wait just a little bit longer.

Let’s talk about movements would be best for you. The movements I’m talking about are not strenuous exercise movements, but rather body conditioning exercises or the pregnancy exercises that you may have done throughout your pregnancy. One such exercise is deep abdominal breathing. Deep abdominal breathing is one of the first movements that you can do that help reactivate those stretched out abdominal muscles.

Another body conditioning exercise that you can do begin within hours of giving birth are Kegels. You may not feel your pelvic floor contractions immediately following the birth but that doesn’t mean that they’re not working. So keep on doing those Kegels.

A third safe exercise are the pelvic tilts. Pelvic tilts feel absolutely wonderful after you get done having birth. They really help stretch those back muscles that might have been tight throughout the end of your pregnancy. Tilts help strengthen the front part of your abdominal muscles, retrain those abdominal muscles and get back in shape.

I hope some of these tips have helped. Please remember that the sooner you start, the sooner your body will respond with firm, tone muscles. Remember that the goal of exercising right after pregnancy is not to do strenuous exercise or build muscle but to start building strength from the inside out. These conditioning exercises will get you off to a really great start.