LIFTING WHILE PREGNANT? Safe Exercises You Can Do for Every Trimester

Our body is really smart at keeping ourselves and our babies safe and, but it's really confusing and it's really scary to navigate. The default is, well, I'll just do nothing. I'll just not exercise then because it feels unsafe to do when there's so much benefit to

exercising. And it's a disservice to tell your patients, to tell your clients to tell the people that you interact with that what they're doing during pregnancy is unsafe because there's really not any inherently dangerous exercises that anyone is going to be doing. So there are a lot of physiologic changes that are occurring during in pregnancy that will probably require some sort of modification. Usually my biggest recommendations is are you comfortable during the lift or

the movement? Are you feeling discomfort anywhere? If so, how can we kind of adjust this to make you more comfortable? If it's a squat, maybe we just squat down to a box. If you're feeling a little bit more pinching in the hips or during the deadlift, well, maybe we elevate the bar so we decrease the range of motion. And we are live. Gina, how are you today? I'm good. How are you doing? I'm wonderfully well, wonderfully well. Life is good.

I got no complaints. I messaged my wife prior to this recording because she's into all the pregnancy pre birth exercise. She's she's deep into the weeds. She's actually due next month with our second son. So she was all excited because she follows y'all and puts some of y'all's exercises into practice. So it'd be good. Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, she's definitely deep into if she's only got a month to go. Yeah, yeah, this is, this will be our 2nd and the first one,

she was all in it as well. And she's she's a bodybuilder too. So she was working out throughout her pregnancy and she's changed a little bit this go around. But there's so much information that doesn't get spoken or I guess it's get spoken but it's not really mainstream understood as far as pregnancy goes, fitness goes, health and nutrition are concerned. So I'm excited to be chatting with you today. Oh yeah, me too. Thanks for having me.

Absolutely. What? What got you interested in this line of work to begin with? So I used to be in the military. I was active duty army and after the birth of my first daughter, I transitioned off of active duty and became a stay at home mom and was just kind of trying to figure out like what I was going to do when I grew up. So I decided that I was going to do perinatal fitness.

I don't know exactly how I got to that, but I figured I just wanted to support people in the same phase of life as me. And so I went back to school. I got a bachelor's and masters in exercise science and I started training in person clients in more like a personal training type format where I was focusing exclusively on pregnancy and postpartum

clients. I'm trying to figure out how I can deliver the programming to them in a way that was accessible, that felt good in their bodies and it was helping them to achieve the different goals that they had. And most of their goals during pregnancy was I want to feel comfortable. I want to move well throughout my pregnancy. I want to be doing exercises that help support preparation for birth. I want to recover and feel more connected in the postpartum.

And so I'm really thankful for the clients that I got to work with at first, primarily in person, so I can figure out my programming, figure out what workouts made sense because how exercise felt for me was not always the way that it felt for other people. And so it wouldn't have been as beneficial for me to just write a program based on my own experience. I'm thankful that I had the experience to work with actual clients.

In 2020 when the whole world shut down, we transitioned a lot of our stuff online and we had already kind of started the process of transitioning online, but we really pushed us to get more online. And so now we not only support folks within our small community, but all over the

world. Now with pre and post Natal fitness, we sprinkle in a lot of childbirth education, but a lot of my main focus is offering support to better understand how your body is moving, how you can better support that movement and understanding kind of like what is actually happening within your body, what is actually happening during birth to make it a lot less scary and mysterious.

A lot of us get told like the discomforts that we have, like they're just a part of being pregnant, like leaking is just a part of being a mom. And so all of these things that have solutions are kind of dismissed as this is just a part of who you are now. And so during my first pregnancy, I was told pelvic pain is totally normal. There's something we can do about it. And I could like barely walk. And so that was unacceptable to me. And like there's no way that

that that that is real. And it's not like you can absolutely have a pain free pregnancy. I learned that there was a lot of movements that we can do to help support an easier labor experience, more comfortable labor experience. And then more importantly, we can do a lot during pregnancy and during postpartum to help us recover in the postpartum so that we can keep up with our kids and we can live a full and active life as mothers raising

our children. Like we don't have to be debilitated by some of the discomfort that we're having. And so that's kind of been my main goal with my business. It's kind of how I got into it. I got 4 kids now. So I've been on the personal journey with a lot of our followers in our community, which has been pretty fun. I've we're, we're, we're stopping now at 4:00. And so now it'll just be more of a mentorship type of journey for me. But it's been, it's been really

fun for the past eight years. It's awesome, awesome. When you were going through your first pregnancy, was there just like a massive hole in the market when you were looking for stuff like this? And I know you said that people were telling you this is normal, but like I feel like people that are going through it don't accept that as you know, the the fact, the truth. So like they're constantly digging. We just having a hard time

finding any information around this. Yeah. So there's definitely a lot more perinatal focus like it counts on Instagram and fitness programs available now in comparison to when I was starting my journey in 2016, 2017. When I was starting, there was like maybe like one or two prenatal programs out there. A lot of them were like really like easy, just breathe, do some gentle yoga.

And I was an athlete. And so I was not interested in doing like a quote UN quote like easy workout throughout my pregnancy. I wanted something that was still challenging but safe for me, that was effective for my current goals. Like I was a collegiate athlete. I was running ultra marathons before I got pregnant.

And so I was used to doing hard workouts and there was not really a lot out there on, well, how can I continue to lift heavy weights and run and do all the activities that I like doing during pregnancy in a way that serves me? And so I spent a lot of my pregnancy trying to like weed through the misinformation that's out there there. There's a lot of conflicting information on what's safe and

what's not safe. Some of the misinformation is just based on like outdated guidance or like a random, some random doctor said this thing one time 50 years ago and it just kind of stuck. And like the heart rate thing, for example, like that was like a random piece of information that got put out and then redacted. And they were like, actually that has, there's nothing to back that up, but it's still a recommendation that people get told or people get like referred to.

And so there was a lot of just like, feeling really confused on what I was allowed to do, like what was safe for me to do. And so I surprisingly was able to kind of reel myself back and just really tune into what felt good in my body and kind of explore movement in that way. I would just kind of modify workouts that I was doing based on like figuring out like, OK, what misinformation is probably correct and which one's not correct? Which ones do I feel comfortable

with? And so it was a really confusing pregnancy and I was able to stay very active throughout. I did develop some SI joint and pelvic pain that I was able to resolve by seeing a chiropractor working with some PTS. But overall just was like really confused and like kind of scared of movement. And a lot of people that reach out to us on Instagram and like on YouTube, they're always, they're, they're concerned. They're like, I was told I

should never lay on my back. I should never twist my heart rate, should never get up this point. And so a lot of the prenatal guidance that a lot of us get exposed to is a long list of don'ts, but there's not really like a list of, but you can do these things and this is how you can do these things safely. And this is how you can move in an effective way. And so it gets really overwhelming and it gets really scary. And so the default is, well, I'll just do nothing.

I'll just not exercise then because it feels unsafe to do when there's so much benefit to exercising. And it's a disservice to tell your patients to tell your clients to tell the people that you interact with that what they're doing during pregnancy is unsafe because there's really not any inherently dangerous exercises that anyone is going

to be doing. It's just like, unless you're at something that has like a really big all risk or there's like, really that's like the only type of dangerous exercise that somebody could do during pregnancy. And like our body is really smart at keeping ourselves and our babies safe. And, but it's really confusing and it's really scary to navigate.

And my first pregnancy was really scary in comparison to my next 3 when I was much more informed based on my own study and my academic programs, my own study on my own working with clients of like what made sense. And those pregnancies were so much more comfortable. I felt so much more confident and that carried into my labor, that carried into my motherhood journey, and so my subsequent journeys were so much more empowered and so much more positive compared to my first.

Gotcha, gotcha. Totally correct me if I'm wrong here. You've been pregnant four times and I have yet to be pregnant. But I'm assuming what I've heard is like as you're an athlete, for instance, because a lot of these listeners are athletes. Whatever your body's used to doing and is acclimated to do currently, like you can pretty much continue that throughout the especially the early phases

of pregnancy. Like if you're a runner before getting pregnant, continuing to run while pregnant makes sense. If you're a lifter beforehand, continuing to do that makes sense. You might not want to like, totally introduce something new, you know, to that extent or that extreme once getting pregnant. But if you're already acclimated to it, your body's pretty resilient to continuing that, right? Yeah. So there's a little bit of nuance to that.

You can absolutely continue workout programs that you've been doing at a fairly high intensity. I would say like in the 1st and 2nd trimester, you might want to lower intensity just a little to like be like 70 to 80% maybe and up to 90% effort levels. So you can still work hard during pregnancy. And the recommendation is at least 150 minutes of moderate intensity, which is a lot of exercise. And that's not including your

warmups and your cooldown. So that's a good amount of lifting and exercising throughout the week that you can do. And if you're already familiar with certain types of lifts and certain types of movements, like by all means, it's probably makes sense for you to continue during your pregnancy. At some point, you will probably need to modify it because mumas might just not feel as comfortable. Like you get this big belly that kind of gets in the way of everything.

And so instead of doing like a normal swat, maybe you do a box swat or you're writing your stance a little bit. Instead of doing like a conventional deadlift, maybe you do sumo or you elevate the bar or maybe you adjust using like kettle bells or dumbbells or bands. And so there will probably be some sort of modification that happens probably towards like the later end of pregnancy,

depending on how fast your belly grows, like kind of how your body is changing. But there are physiologic changes that are happening that will require some modification. Like your center of gravity is going to shift forward and up. So you're the way that you kind of balance is going to slightly change. And because of that, the way that you manage pressure is going to be different. So you're probably not going to be able to lift as heavy as

outside of pregnancy. It doesn't mean that you can't lift heavy, it's just not going to be relative, maybe as high as you were before. Your joints have a little bit more laxity to them, so you're not necessarily instable by any means, but how you stabilize is going to kind of adjust because there's a little bit more movement happening within our joints. So there are a lot of physiologic changes that are occurring during pregnancy that will probably require some sort of modification.

Usually my biggest recommendations is are you comfortable during the lift or the movement? Are you feeling discomfort anywhere? If so, how can we kind of adjust this to make you more comfortable if you're feeling pain in your lower back with your lift that you normally don't? Well, if it's a squat, maybe we just squat down to a box. So we kind of decrease range of motion. We add some support to make you feel more comfortable.

If you're feeling a little bit more pinching in the hips or during the deadlift, well, maybe we elevate the bar so we decrease the range of motion. If we're running and we're noticing like, wow, my belly like really hurts when I run because those ligaments, they're just kind of bouncing around. Maybe we can add a belly band so that we have a little bit more support there. Or maybe we adjust to a lower

impact activity. Instead of running, we go to walking, we go to the elliptical, maybe we swim, we can Aqua Dog. We can still achieve the same goal and the intent with maybe a different shape or a different movement that still achieves what you want but doesn't in a way that's much more comfortable for you during your pregnancy. It's really not necessary to like force through discomfort or pain. Like you can absolutely modify

in ways that makes sense. On the other end of that, if you have never exercised before in your life or maybe you're not quite as familiar with certain types of movements, you can absolutely start a brand new exercise program during pregnancy. A lot of folks are sedentary

before they move into pregnancy. I think your listeners are probably on the more active side, but for folks that maybe are listening that are don't have like a really established workout program, you can start during pregnancy at like 100%, but start like a novice. Like don't start like you've been lifting for 10 years for the first time during pregnancy. Maybe start like you've lifted like a week during pregnancy.

So we have clients that come to our gym who have never exercised before in their life and they finish their pregnancy lifting the barbell and that's a really big accomplishment for them. They feel really strong, they feel really good in their bodies. So I think you can absolutely continue exercise during your pregnancy that you're doing pre pregnancy. There will probably be some sort of modification that needs to occur while you are pregnant,

which is totally fine. It doesn't decrease your value as an athlete or as a person by any means. It's OK to lift less weight. It's OK to not run quite as much mileage. Just think about what feels comfortable in your body is like a good starting point and then modify as needed. Think about how stable do I feel in this lift? Do I feel comfortable? Do I feel like I can manage pressure well? If not, maybe we just need to adjust a little bit.

But you can absolutely start new workout programs during pregnancy, but approach it like a beginner. Don't approach it like you've been lifting for 10 years. Just ease into it. Maybe we start with like bands and some lighter dumbbells and then we kind of progress from there for our new exercisers. I would say like working with a trainer, joining a fitness program where you can like follow a video can be really helpful.

So getting someone to really guide you through will be much more important if you're starting brand new during pregnancy as opposed to outside of pregnancy. Just because there's different things that are happening within your body that we want to be just more mindful of how we're lifting and how we're moving. Because there is a little bit potentially a little bit more risk of injury if you are like not used to exercising before or you may just be really nervous.

And so it's helpful to have someone to guide you as opposed to trying to figure out on your own.

Totally makes sense. And I feel like for people that are coming from a lifting background and, and not wanting to lose any lean tissue, I mean, as long as you're keeping that muscle stimulated in some form or fashion, even if you're not lifting as heavy, like it's relatively easy to preserve the muscle you've got as long as you're keeping it in demand, even if it's not on the upper end of that extreme.

Yeah, absolutely. So for me personally, like I was lifting weights before I got pregnant for the first time. I've continued to lift weights throughout all my pregnancies, lifting weights in between. I'm not like a power lifter or like Olympic weight lifter or anything. Like I don't compete as a lifter, but I did compete previously as a runner before I got pregnant. And so now I'm currently training for a marathon, haven't

run really in like 8 years. And it's coming back to me really fast because it's something that I had been doing for a decade before. And so I'm a firm believer if you've been doing it, it's going to come back to you quickly. And this is just a short phase like pregnancy. I would say maybe like the last three months, you might notice that your weights have to lower a little bit. Maybe we have to accommodate a little bit for how we're feeling in our bodies, but it'll come back quickly.

And then postpartum, especially if you are mindful with your progression in the postpartum and not rush the process, you're

going to be able to lift a lot heavier. You're going to be able to run a lot faster. And so just remember that this is like maybe 18 months of your life. It's OK if workouts look a little bit different and we kind of change what our goals are. Like our goals during pregnancy are not to win a competition. Our goals during pregnancy is to make it through our birth in a way that feels comfortable for us and then more importantly, to help us recover easier postpartum.

Totally. When it comes to athletes, people that are lifting, people that have muscular developments, that's typically always seen as a positive by most people's standards. You're more flexible on average.

But when you're actually going into labor and the birth is looming, is there any drawbacks to having that, you know, just muscle density and tightness and, and you know what you would think of from a lifting standpoint, like when you're really needing to just allow the body to relax and open up and, and just totally be at peace. So there is some controversy

about this. There are people that work in birth that believe that if somebody's lifting weights, if they're doing CrossFit, if they're powerlifting, their pelvic floors are going to be so tight that their babies cannot navigate there and they're going to be, they're going to have AC section. So the thought is if you lift weights, you'll have AC section because your pelvic floor is going to be way too tight or you'll have a really long labor.

There's some wants to this as well, like just touching a weight doesn't automatically make your pelvic floor really tight. I think what's really important if we're lifting weights throughout pregnancy and just exercise in general is to pay attention to the directions of movement that are incorporated within our workout program.

So a lot of like squats and deadlifts and traditional lifting programs are very Saturnal plane, very front to back like everything is extension and external rotation, extension and external rotation. And so if we're always emphasizing this one movement plane and this one movement pattern, there's there's going to be some changes of tension

within our pelvic floor. And so we're always emphasizing like the squats and the deadlifts and the cleans and the snatches and everything is in this direction. We're going to have a very tight back half of our pelvic floor. We're probably going to favor a lot of extension and we're going to favor a lot of external rotation, which are great positions for power. That's how we generate power to come out of lifts. That's how we propel ourselves forward. So really great place to be if

you want to be very athletic. However, we also need to incorporate side to side type movements and also rotational movements. So we need to be in the transverse plane and we need to be in the frontal plane. And so if we are incorporating our main lifts with our bilateral movements, so both legs and arms moving at the same time, we have our squats or deadlift, squat or clean snatches, everything that's extension, external rotation,

extension, external rotation. In addition to can we add in some abduction and adduction so our side to side movements. So maybe we're doing like side lunges, maybe we're doing lateral band walks, we're incorporating movements that are strengthening the side glute musculature and the inner thigh musculature, especially the inner thigh musculature.

Your adductors and your inner thighs are incredibly important for one pelvic stability, but also helping to createspace in the bottom part of your pelvis and the back part of your pelvis. And so muscles only have the

ability to pull. And so the adductors help to pull the bottom of the pelvis open, which if somebody does have a tight pelvic cord from lifting, they're going to see issues when they're like 8 centimeters and they get stuck or they push for like 4 or five hours and their babies won't come out. And then they have AC section. That's going to be why not? I mean, I don't want to blame anybody but the inner thighs, we need to strengthen them to help pull the bottom of the pelvis open.

In addition, we need to strengthen the hamstrings because those also help to pull the pelvis open. And if we always favor an extended position, so we're always an extension to generate power, we're going to have a hard time finding a rounded position. So can we bring movement side to side in addition to rotationally? Not just in the rib cage, but

also in the pelvis. And so within our hips, we have external internal hip rotation, which is how is the hip or the femur moving in the socket versus pelvic rotation, internal and external, which is how is the pelvis moving on the femur? So similar, but like it's kind of like what is the anchor point? We need to be able to find internal and external hip and pelvic rotation during if you're an athlete, the internal rotation is the harder 1.

So being able to find internal hip rotation and internal pelvic rotation are more challenging. And those are also going to be things that contribute towards those late labor stall. So you're like 8 centimeters, you've been pushing for a long time. So if we can incorporate exercises where you find closed hip positions, this is known as like a hip shift, which if people are not familiar with that is just go to YouTube and type in mom stay fit hip shift.

So like your hips shifting, I mean, you'll see what that looks like because it's, it's kind of hard to explain, but essentially it's the pelvis rotating towards the femur. So you're going to feel a little bit more of a stretch and like your glue area, this is stretching like the back half of

your pelvic floor where your sacrum is attaching. And this is creating a lot of space in the back half and the bottom of your pelvis. And so we want to be able to focus a little bit more on the inner thigh strengthening if you are an athlete. We want to focus on more of the internal hip and pelvic rotation to create that space in the bottom part of the pelvis. And we want to focus on more back rounding. So can I release my lats and

round in my back? We have a whole free birth prep circuit that kind of addresses all these common issues that athletes have and just people, women in general have during pregnancy. And so we have exercise to help to release the backside of the body. We have exercise to help you find a hip shift. We have a few different variations, so those would be

like my main recommendations. If somebody is an athlete, they love lifting weights because I love lifting weights, but they don't want to have complications during their labor. Touching a weight does not automatically make your polyp for tight, but only moving in One Direction in the same movement pattern all the time can. And so we want to incorporate the bilateral movements to build strength because that's how we maintain our muscle mass.

Having more muscle mass is going to help to reduce prenatal complications. So it's going to reduce your risk of developing gestational diabetes, hypertension, preeclampsia. So other complications that could occur. But we want to make sure that we're incorporating side to side movements in addition to rotational movements. And so as long as you incorporate a good variety of accessory work, you're probably

setting yourself up really good. And then grab our free birth prep circuit and just add that in as your warm up and you're going to feel one probably more comfortable within your body. But yeah, so if you cannot round your back, that's a problem. If you cannot like find internal rotation, that would be a problem. So those would be things that I would like hyper focus on. If you only do squats and deadlifts, we need to do accessory work.

Add an accessory work on one side of your body please. Yeah, no, my wife Crystal, I mean, she is, she's still doing all of her compound lifts and stuff, but I mean, she is like best friends with the medicine ball and resistance bands and all kinds of auxiliary stuff now as well. Are there like other tools that you recommend people just have at the comfort of their own home to just, you know, make it habit of incorporating in some form of fashion every day?

It's like like the resistance bands and the exercise balls. Oh yeah, I love resistance bands. We we use them a lot with a lot of our exercises. You can also use a cable machine for the resistance band, but the resistance band is usually easier to have at home. And I would say yoga block, but also be really helpful. That can really help with kind of the pelvic rotation work.

We use it a lot with our hip shifted exercises, kind of force you a little bit more onto one side to help with more of that release. Having like a door anchor for your bands can be really helpful too, if you're working out in more like a home setting and you don't have like a gym set up in your house or gym that you work out at. So that way you can attach bands. Having that lateral resistance can be really beneficial for

your exercises as well. So yeah, I would say looped bands over ones with handles because they're a little bit more versatile because you can put it on your legs, you can hold them in your hands. But yeah, and you can, the bands are like our favorites for rotational work. Yeah. So those I would say bands have some weights. I would say like medium ish weights is a pretty good option if you are only going to be pretty limited on what you have. And then a yoga block would be

like my my main must haves. Nice, nice. And you're a doula too, right? I am. Nice. Yeah. So Crystal, so our first time we're going to do like the whole totally natural home birth situation, but then his positioning was all jacked up face presentation and we were rushed in for an emergency section. So the furthest thing from what we had planned on doing. So with the second kiddo, I mean, she she's we got some awesome duelers right now, but we're doing like all the

spinning baby stuff. So like every day we're rebozoing her and all, you know, all this stuff that's totally new to me. Are there some other like just daily practices with stretches and mobility stuff that you think are just proactively a wise move? So spinning babies is a great resource. Some sometimes their websites a little confusing to navigate, but the main concept is we want to think about babies position as in like they're like in a water balloon where like to make

it simple. And the different ligaments that attach the uterus to the different structures within your body can have different levels of tension, which can kind of squish your water balloon a little bit. And so the baby can't move as easily around in their little balloon. It could impact their position.

And So what Spinning babies is doing and kind of what we do with our birth prep circuit too, and there's so many different like circuits that you can find of people who are kind of drawing from similar concepts, but putting their own little spin on it based on where they come from. With spinning babies, the big thing that we're doing is

releasing the different uterine ligament. So we've got like the broad ligament across the front of the uterus. So if babies movements are like kind of painful, like their kicks and their rolls like kind of hurt, that ligament might be really tight. And if that front ligament is a little bit tighter, it could be a little bit harder for baby to drop into the pelvis. And so doing like a belly lift, you can do with like a robosa where you lift the belly and kind of gently shimmy it.

That can help to release that ligament. I also find like just pelvic tilting where you kind of like lift your belly up and in can help to release tension in that ligament. So that's like one way to release that one. On the front side. We also have the round ligaments that run vertically. So they run from kind of like the middle of your uterus to

your labia. So if you have like lightning crotch, which is like a sharp electric feeling in your vagina, I know that you don't know what that feels like, but just imagine someone just shocking you just then you're in between, doesn't feel great, but it'll be like a sudden thing and then it goes away. Or if you have pain a little bit to one side with sudden hip extension. So when you stand up and there's like a sharp pain like in your lower abdomen, those are your round ligaments.

So things like hip flexor releases can be helpful for that. You can also do like inversion. So like a forward leaning inversion is a move that we include in our birth prep circuit and is also part of like the spinning babies daily Essentials or their, they used to call it their three sisters, but it's, I think it's called 3 balances or something now. So the forward leaning inversion can help to kind of stretch those out. Hip flexor releases are really great for that.

I like to do something called a 9090 side camel. It's kind of like a Shim box below where you like extend up in your hip a little bit. Again, listeners are like, I don't know what that is Mama say fit side camel in YouTube and you'll see what it looks like. So anything that kind of releases that area, you can also like massage it on your own, which can be really helpful because you'll feel the band from the ligament and at the very bottom of the uterus, we

have uterus sacral ligaments. So these attach the bottom like cervical area to your sacrum. And if those kind of like get tight or twisted, it can make it hard for baby to one get into a head down position. So if baby is kind of stuck in breach, sometimes it's because those ligaments have kind of decreased the space in the bottom of the uterus. Or if baby can't get into like a good chin tuck position, it can also be that. So inversions are really helpful

for that. For inversions, you would just do them like once or twice a day to kind of release and you would hold it for maybe like 20 to 30 seconds or like 3 really deep and slow breaths. But with the four leaning inversion, you'll feel more of like a stretch, kind of like the lower back sacral area and maybe in the round ligaments.

And if the inversion is too much, especially if you get like super light headed, you can just do like a puppy pose where like your hips are higher than your chest. So if you're on your bed and you're kind of like child's pose to do with like your butt high, that can also help to release

that area. So anything that it kind of addresses balancing the ligaments can be really helpful to do like as a daily like essentials type of thing because that's going to help to support your baby's movement and position through your pelvis. So their positions are not random. They are based on the space that's available for them, which is like a big thing that spinning babies believe, something that like I follow

along with and believe as well. And then we can kind of go further out where we think about what muscles are kind of supporting the different structures that may be impacting how your pelvis can move and how your uterus is positioning itself. And that's where our birth circuit kind of comes in, where if your lats are super tight and your hip flexors are super tight, it's going to kind of push you forward and that's going to decrease how well your

baby can drop into your pelvis. And so if you have a very extended position, I wish I had models right now, I'm just using like my hands. But if you have a more extended spine, it's just going to push baby forward so they can't quite drop into your pelvis. And so if you can find a more rounded position, it's going to kind of bring like the uterus up and allow it to kind of drop in. So releasing lads, hip flexors

can help to improve that. And then again, that internal rotation is going to help to improve how well the pelvis can open, particularly the bottom half. And that back half of the pelvic floor tends to get very tight for like everybody, but a little bit more so for athletes who very much favor like the bilateral compound movements. So yeah, there's a lot of stuff that you can do to help support

your pregnancy comfort. But I would say, think about can I balance my ligaments, which the spinning babies like three sisters or essential movements can be really helpful for that. And then we can think about the surrounding structures, what else is surrounding my uterus that I feel like I can release

tension. And you can see professionals to help support you with this too. Spinning Babies has like body workers on their website, you can see a Webster certified chiropractor. They really address how well the pelvis is moving. You can work with like a massage therapist like I saw like I my massage therapist during pregnancy was awesome to like helping me to release tension. And you can also work with pellet for physical therapy

during pregnancy as well. As long as you don't have any sort of condition that you can't have like penetrative sex. Like you're, you can have an internal exam if you want and have internal release if you want during pregnancy. If you're not comfortable with that or your PT is not comfortable with that, there's a lot that we can do externally to help support your movement. And if you can't find APT in your area, we do have PTS at our gym that do virtual support as

well. Then they, they like a lot of their stuff is external, so they don't need to do internal work to see, to know that there's something going on with your pelvic floor. Like if you walk a certain way, there's something going on with your pelvic floor. And so those are like different professionals that you can work with to kind of help with the release. I worked with RPT at the end of my pregnancy to kind of address some like pelvic war stuff that was going on.

And that was super beneficial and helpful for me and I think really helped to support my baby's position as well. But yeah, so there's a lot that you can do. I would say like if your list is overwhelming, just focus on where do I feel tight and can I release into it a little bit more would be like a good starting point. Yeah, I mean your resources online, I'm definitely to check

that out. I know she follows you already has been getting some stuff from you, but yeah having like a downloadable PDF or something makes makes. Sense we have a lot of PDFs, we have a lot of free PDF PDFs. We have a birth partner one too that I'll send you. Nice. Yeah, that's what I need. What about sleeping? So, like, when you're trying to just, you know, be proactive, mitigate any pains and set yourself up for success. You know, I've heard of the don't sleep on your back situation.

Like when it comes to just best sleep practice, what should women going through pregnancy try and optimize for? So I would say get yourself like a bomb ass pregnancy pillow and just make a nest for you. Adding a lot of additional support is gonna be really helpful to keep yourself comfortable while sleeping, which can feel very elusive during pregnancy. I suffered from a lot of pregnancy insomnia, also probably some pregnancy anxiety and just like have a hard time getting comfortable.

And I think that's pretty common for a lot of folks. So things that you can do during the day is try to increase your magnesium intake so that can help you kind of rest and relax before you go to sleep. You can do like meditations or more mindfulness practices. Gentle Birth has an app that you can use that has like meditation specific for pregnancy and for

birth. You can find some like hypnobirthing ones, YouTube or like Peloton all there's so many different like meditation things I think like insight timer or something like that. But do something to help kind of down regulate yourself before you go to sleep can be really beneficial before going to bed. When you're sleeping, using the pregnancy pill to find different comfortable positions can be

super beneficial. Ideally you'd like you don't have to be off your back during the first two trimesters if you feel comfortable on your back like it's usually not an issue until maybe the third trimester. If you wake up on your back, it's usually not a problem, but if you do prefer being on your back because so for me, I started having a little bit more heartburn towards the end, some pregnancy congestion to where being flat, which is really uncomfortable.

You can take your pregnancy pillow and kind of like fold it in half to make like almost like this sea. I don't know how old you are, but we, you know, those like blow up chairs or like bean bag chairs like that make that and then you can lean on it and then you're inclined and then you can usually that's pretty comfortable to sleep in during pregnancy. And then you can use a pillow to lay on your side or either side. And it's OK to flip sides.

Some folks have been told that they can only lay on their left side and they're like, but I hate my left side. My right side feels more comfortable. Sleep on whatever side feels most comfortable for you. It's OK if it's your right side. This is where kind of like the fear mongering comes in for pregnancy that makes it scary to exist as somebody who's pregnant. Sleep on whatever side feels most comfortable for you.

If you're having more like hip or pelvic pain while sleeping, make sure that the knee and the ankle are generally aligned to one another and then you can squeeze like a pillar or something between your legs before you switch size. It can be a really helpful thing to do if you're having a lot of like hip pain. Check out your mattress. Is your really, do you have a really old mattress? Maybe we need a new mattress or if you're like, well, I don't want to buy a whole new mattress.

I got all this other baby stuff I need to buy. Get a mattress Topper, like one that's maybe a little bit more firm, maybe one that's a little bit more soft like experiment with what kind of Topper you need for your mattress. And so that's an easy way to help you come to a more comfortable place without having to like invest in a full new $1000 plus mattress. So get a mattress Topper.

The other thing that you can do is you can also take like a small pillow or like rolled up towel and put it underneath your like your waist. So like in between where your ribs and your pelvis are, that little gap right there, just putting like something small, like maybe like 2 inches in diameter, like right there could help prevent you from just being like completely like conked over to the side and adds a little

bit of support. Or you can use that same one to put under your belly, like kind of vertically, like aligned with your torso can help to add some support. So there's a lot of different sleeping positions that you can do. We do have like a YouTube video that I can send you that has some different ideas on positions to do while sleeping using a gigantic pregnancy pillow. But yeah, there's going to be a little bit of experimenting. It's OK if you wake up a lot.

Pregnancy insomnia can be pretty pretty common. I would say increasing magnesium is like a good way. You can do like different lotions on your legs too if you get like restless legs. Doing some meditations and then trying to find as comfortable position as possible. For me I was just like husband get away from me. I am in my nest. I need my space so that I can move freely. Yeah, for us, it's like our our three-year old is just all about snuggling with her.

So he's just jumping up in the bed and she's like, no, I'm in

my cocoon right now, don't mess with me. So that's been interesting for sure. Had that problem with all my kids sleep in bed with us. And so we now have a king and a queen on the floor next to each other. And so I just like slowly try to like migrate each child to like my husband. But my, you know, my third daughter, she just kind of crawled into the nest and just slept with me. And I was like, yeah, whatever, it's fine. What? What about after the birth?

So I guess let's just kind of breakdown recovery for both a vaginal birth and a caesarean section. Like what, what kind of differences does that create? When can someone or should someone try to resume training after that? Because I feel like society puts all this pressure on, you know, new, new mothers to like, get back to the normal day day ASAP. And I feel like that kind of hindered us the first time with that emergency C-section.

So like what? What's your recommendation from a movement standpoint as it pertains to recovery after birth? So my general recommendation is probably no earlier than four to six weeks postpartum before you resume like structured exercise. And that's like very light, like very, very light exercise. Before that, we need anything about the tissue healing timeline. So the first like 4 to six weeks postpartum is healing from the

planned injury of birth. Whether you had a vaginal birth or you had AC section, you are injured from birth and we need to recover from that. And the tissue healing timeline really needs you to take your time during this phase. So the first just like week to like 2 weeks is like inflammation. There's lots of swelling, lots of blood flow, trying to like heal initially from that trauma.

So trying to be generally off your feet as much as possible can be really helpful just to allow your body to like really heal. If you had AC section adding on like a belly band to provide some external support, it can be really helpful that like very gentle compression can aid with healing as well by kind of increasing blood flow to their swell. But we don't want belly bands to be so tight that you can't breathe. We're not trying to shrink our waist by any means.

Physically bringing muscles together does not heal them or like heal diastasis or anything either. Like we're just applying like just really, really gentle compression just to aid with that healing after if somebody's had AC section as well. You can also add in some desensitization work at this time where you're just kind of touching generally around the incision site with like

different types of textures. So like a makeup brush, AQ tip your hands, maybe like a scarf just to kind of reset the sensation in that area. So if somebody has like a lot of sensitivity or a lot of numbness, doing desensitization work can be really helpful for that. After about like the first dish week postpartum, this is where the placental scab is going to come off. And so you may notice like a slight increase in bleeding for

a few hours. You might notice like a clot come out, but after a few hours, it should go back down. And around this time, we're also moving into like the next stage of tissue feeling, which the tissue is, is like starting to rebuild itself. It's starting to get a little bit stronger, but it's still in a very like immature phase. And so if we usually start to feel a little bit better at this point, you don't quite feel like he got hit by like a really big

truck anymore. It's just like a minivan at this time. So you're still like not quite there, but you're, you feel much better. It's, it's, it's like a significant difference. You're like, well, that dump truck last week was huge, but this car much smaller. So we're still in a healing phase, but you feel much better. And so this is usually when folks start to like push it a little bit too much.

But if you, if you think about like when you sprain your ankle and then it starts to feel better and you like run again and then you sprain it again because it wasn't quite fully healed. This is kind of like a similar thing. Like you probably are starting to feel better, but the tissue is still very weak at this point and it doesn't really begin to become more mature until around

the four to six week mark. So it's still important to be very mindful in this first kind of month postpartum. But this doesn't mean you should do nothing. Like you should still move 'cause there's gonna be like muscles are gonna atrophy, like you're gonna be uncomfortable if you just stay perfectly still in bed for six weeks. So you could do like gentle mobility. You can do breathing exercises, which is really a great way to connect with your deep core and begin to rebuild that process.

You can do like really gentle core exercises. You can start integrating some walks as well. But it's all like very loose. There's no like protocol. There's no like do 8 reps of this this many times just like exploring how movement feels in your body and really just like being in your little postpartum bubble with your newborn baby and just primarily focus on bonding with that.

Like the exercise portion is like kind of an afterthought, like if you're, if you're sore, do some extra mobility to feel better in your body. But we're not trying to like crush it right now. This is, this is like the first month like you are kind of doing this like gentle movement type of stuff. We have like a whole free early postpartum recovery course that people can follow where I gently guide you through because some folks like need someone to tell

them to like sit their ass down. And I will do that for people because it's really beneficial to sit down and rest in this first phase to allow your body to just heal from this very big event of giving birth. Something that was really helpful for me to help kind of reign myself in was remembering that the only body that has created life is the postpartum body. And that is really incredible and like. You can't beat it. Like you can't. I literally made a person like,

that's pretty cool. Like if I ran an ultra marathon, people would not be like, oh, why aren't you already running again? Like why aren't you back to your normal workouts? No, they'd be like, Oh yeah, you should totally rest for like a few weeks and like regain yourself. Yeah, you literally created a life. Rest for a month. It's OK after kind of this first month ish. And it, it can vary from person to person depending on like, did you have a lot of bleeding? Do you have AC section?

It might, it might get close to like the six to 10 week mark. It's OK, okay, like is this a really, really short phase time? After that we can kind of ease into exercise again. And it's very slow. It's very mindful. It's kind of like baby stepping our way back. So think about like you're restarting a workout program and this is a really good opportunity to kind of train out all those bad habits that you had pre pregnancy.

Because I had some bad movement habits that I just was like compensating for because I wanted to do my lift. But now I'm forcing myself to start all over and my lifts felt so much stronger. They I was lifting so much heavier. I was running without pain because I took the time postpartum to like rebuild. And it's not like 7 years, it's like 3 months us to focus on more like the rehab kind of rebuilding time frame.

So the way that our postpartum program works 'cause I already invented the wheel for everybody if they need it, as we start primarily with like floor based movements, we decrease the number of joints that are moving and we're really just reconnecting with how our breath is connecting with our body. So how do I breathe and then how do I move my arms and legs in comparison to that breath to coordinate our breath to

movement? And that's how we're going to manage pressure a lot better, which is going to help to relieve a lot of pelvic core issues that folks are having. And that's going to help you lift heavier too. And then we just like slowly add on. So week 1 is like a kneeling squat. So we've only got really like the hip and knee joint moving.

We're not worrying about the ankle and we're just focusing on can I extend my hip and exhale at the same time and then can I inhale as I lower and that's all. And that's like the squat movement. And then there's accessory work, tons of accessory work. Our programs are known for all the accessory work that we include. And then like the next week. OK, well, now that we've done our kneeling squat, you've got that down. We're going to do a box squat

now. So we got the feet, but I'm going to decrease your range of motion. You're not going super far down. We're just, I know it's body weight. I know that you want to lift that barbell so bad, but just just do this box squat. All right, now, the next week, all right, now we're gonna come

to an air squat. So you don't got support anymore and we're going to do our air squat. All right, awesome, you look great. Let's add on some weight. Hold on to some dumbbells and do your box squat. Hold on some dumbbells, do your air squat. And now here's the barbell. So we're at like week 5 or 6 and now we're adding on barbell because we're spending all of this time slowly rebuilding and exploring the movement, kind of wedding out all those bad habits

that we've had. And now we got a barbell and we're feeling much better in our body. And then we can just start adding weight because now all the bad movement habits we've trained out of ourselves for the past five weeks. And so that's what the progression kind of look like for us as we start small and then we slowly rebuild. And I mean, we have professional athletes that work with us. We've had like Olympians that work with us. And so like our progressions work. They, they make sense.

They're like, they require a lot of patience, but you can rush the process and at six months postpartum, you're going to have a lot of issues. And then you're going to come back to us and you're going to be like, hey, so I know you told me to come work with you and I didn't, but here I am. And so just let's just go ahead and skip all that and just start slow from the beginning. I mean, you don't have to work with us. There's so many postpartum

trainers out there now. There's so many postpartum programs out there now based on your specific goals, but start small and just explore, really connect with your body, reconnect with how you're breathing, how your core and your arms and legs and all those things are moving. Feel good in your body and then know that they're going to be hiccups because you're not pre kids training anymore. Now you got a little human who goes to their own little phases.

So you'll get into your little your your little string of exercises. You're like on target and then like they have a sleep regression and you're like, I slept 3 hours last night. Alright, we're going to do 20 hour workouts, 20 minute workout today. So postpartum, like return to fitness can be mind numbingly slow and require a lot of patience, but it's worth being patient. And remember that you literally made at least one human being. Maybe you made two, I don't

know, maybe had twins, triplets. So that's pretty incredible. And I think that we can honor that and think and be OK with taking our time with this process because really like who could tell you what? Like you made a person. Yeah, no, I totally completely agree. In in your experience, have you found that that one recovers faster than another between the cesarean and the vaginal from like a back to training standpoint? I think the difference is how much blood did you lose.

I think that has more of an impact on how quickly someone can return to high intensity exercise. If you didn't have a lot of blood loss, usually I see that those folks return to exercise a little bit quicker than folks who've had a lot of blood left. So if you had like a blood transfusion, you are going to be taking your time because it takes a long time to rebuild and re establish all that blood. So that I find that to be more of a factor than between the

two. The biggest things that I find for folks that have had AC section though is sometimes there's a little bit this connection with the core. So we have different like myofascial slings that run through our body that help kind of connect our upper body to our lower body through our pelvis. And the anterior oblique sling kind of runs from like your chest through obliques across the front of your pelvis into your opposite inner thigh and that gets severed during AC section.

And so I find that a lot of our C-section clients have a little bit of disconnection like with their core and with like inner thigh type movements. And so we incorporate a lot of that into our postpartum programs specific for knee section to help with that reconnection. And we've had a lot of success with our C-section clients feeling much more connected and getting back to high levels of

fitness again. So if somebody has had AC section focusing on exercises that kind of like rotate to the front with like the opposite knee coming towards that chest. So if you think like an upper chop movement or like a pay off press, those are all going to really help with that reconnection after AC section because again, that that's that sling gets severed. And so we have to re establish that neurological connection. Now this is also something that

we can do pre birth as well. If you are like planning AC section or even if you're not planning AC section, incorporating those anterior oblique sling movements can one help with cubic synthesis pain, but also give you that familiarity for the postpartum. So if you do have AC section, you are already familiar with that movement pattern and it's easier to reconnect. So that would be like my 1

caveat for C-section. Would any of your recommendations change for someone doing AV back by chance? In regards to like preparation or like postpartum? Either I mean that's what we're planning on doing. We did the you know emergency C-section the first time we're planning on the V back this go around. So anything that you would have them have her do differently?

So my main thing for my feedback clients is to add in scar mobilization during pregnancy. Now, it's not going to be super deep, but absolutely like mobilize that scar to make sure all those tissues are moving around because that tissue is also in the uterus as well. And so we want to make sure that the scar is not going to be impacting baby's position. And so doing mobility work can be really helpful for there.

You can use like cups externally where you just put some lotion or like oil down and then you can use like a massage cup across the scar if you can't quite grab it. Just like little circles where you're just kind of moving the skin around. If there's anywhere that feels like more bumpy or like crunchy, spending a little bit more time there, she won't be able to get like super deep with it just because she's pregnant. But you like the cops are like

hand stuff can be super helpful. And then with me back there is I think even more just kind of letting go and surrendering to the process. And so having a support team, having like the provider that you all have chosen to be someone that you truly trust to guide you through, that's not going to pressure you in any way is going to make a huge difference whether you have a ventral birth or you guys have

another C-section. Because if you have a team that you truly trust, believes in her ability to give birth via feedback, then it's going to be a lot much easier if the birth plan has to change for whatever reason, because it's not because the team forced you in that direction, if that makes sense.

So I find having like a really supportive provider in a really supportive support team is huge and for everybody, but especially for V back when there is almost this like pressure to have a certain type of birth as like a redemptive or to make up

for the last time. And so having that supportive team can make a really, really big difference regardless of what path you have and the ability to surrender to know, hey, I've done everything I can to prepare myself the best that I can for this birth. And it's OK if the plan changes, but we're going to do as much as we can to have the voucher and birth that we're wanting. I think it's like really, really

helpful. But all the other stuff that we kind of talked about with the mobility work and the different exercises to help release common areas of tension, to release the urine ligament are going to be crucial to preparing for a feedback to giving everyone like kind of the best chance for a baby to get into really good position. I would focus even more so on like mindset stuff as well of

like releasing and surrendering. And I would say that for any athlete, learning how to surrender and like let go of the ego is huge when it comes to labor because sometimes contractions are harder than we thought they were going to be. Sometimes labor lasts longer. Sometimes labor is faster when then we thought it would be, which you would think is easier, but it can sometimes be more intense. And so we can't always predict how labor goes.

But learning how to surrender and let go of our ego and allow it to unfold the way that it needs to can just make it make there just be less tension involved with it. Yeah. Oh, very wise words for sure. I'll put myself in the hot seat for a second here. You as a doula. I mean, you've attended countless bursts. You've seen everything, you know, front row seat, the dynamic between husband and wife, all that jazz. What is like the worst thing I could do? What's the best thing I could

do? Like how should I set myself up for success to be the best? The worst thing you can do the worst thing you can do is eat a tuna sandwich. Somebody do that I guess, right? I would say like the worst thing that you can do, which I don't anticipate that you would do this is like take a nap without permission or just be like distracted with your phone or trying to do work as a partner. Being like mentally and physically present is incredibly

important supporting birth. And now there may be like conflicting needs during labor. Like I need to get our child to childcare or like coordinate something. So my husband is usually like the external coordinator as well for us. So I understand that he's not going to be like 1000% there because he also has to coordinate with these other people.

But once kind of like the initial coordinations are done, then it's just like sole focus on her and focusing on what does she need and being OK if maybe she's like don't touch me or don't do that, like don't take offense. Sometimes it's easier to just get like one or two words out as the person that's in labor to communicate what you're needing. But being physically present and being mentally present are huge.

And so if you are the primary communicator with people outside the space, like maybe we don't need to give everyone minute by minute updates. Maybe they get it like or in labor, we'll let you know the baby's here.

Because sometimes I'll see partners that are like constantly on their phone texting like mom and mother-in-law and dad and the eight siblings to where like they're so distracted by like communicating with everybody else that they are like not able to be there like for their spouse, which is always like kind of sad. But the best first that I'm at are the ones where like the phones are put away and everyone is just like super just like

lovey. Like I almost like cry every labor that I support where like the partners are like so connected because it's really beautiful. Like it's, it's like such an intimate moment between two people that have chosen to like create a person and like give birth to that person and like seeing them connect with one another. Like in this really hard time. I think it's like incredible. I don't know if that was helpful, but just be physically and mentally present.

Be adaptive. I understand that you're probably also the person that's coordinating externally and try to get that stuff all taken care of as quickly as you can so that you can be available. I find is like the best thing that a partner can do is to just be there like physically and then learn how to do hip squeezes, learn different comfort measures. So my husband had like a checklist of things that he knew I liked.

And then when he didn't know what I wanted, he would just like go through the list and be like, do you want me to squeeze your hips? I was like, yes, do that. He's like, do you want to use the shower? And I was like, the shower sounds great. And so he just had like a little list that he would go through. If you guys have a doula, even better. She'll just, they'll just tell you the answers to the test, but they're like, would you like to try the shower?

It's like ask for that. I have had that backfire like once or twice where I like tell a partner, like ask her if she wants a tissue because her nerves are super runny. And then she was like, how dare you ask me that? And I'm like, that was me, I'm sorry. But otherwise, like, as long as you're physically and mentally there and you are willing to suffer alongside it'll, it'll be good. All right, good. Noted, Noted. Yet it'll be here for you know

it next next month. So I'm taking notes for sure. I will say also make sure that you eat and drink fluids too because I have partners like just like fall out because they were not taking care of themselves during the long laborers. So still make sure that you were also drinking anything. Gotcha, gotcha. I will definitely do that. Tell me about your book. So my book is called Training for Two. It is all about how you can use prenatal fitness to stay strong

throughout your pregnancy. There's a lot of modifications in there for lifts. So some of the reviews that we've had was this is for athletes. I'm like it says that on the cover. So we have lifts in there and how you can modify like all the compound lifts. So your squats, your dead lifts, your hip thrusts, your bench press, your rows, because you should absolutely lift weights throughout pregnancy because

it's helpful for you. It's going to help you stay more comfortable, but you might need to change how you do it. So we offer those modifications and we also offer within the book ways for you to stay pain free because pain is not a requirement of pregnancy and it's not a requirement of motherhood. You can absolutely not have pelvic pain during your pregnancy.

And so we have a whole chapter that's just on avoiding pelvic pain or resolving pelvic pain, how to overcome some pelvic core issues, how to sleep better, how to avoid tailbone pain. So there's tons the common ailments that we have within the book that we provide movement solutions to within the book. There are pictures in in addition to written descriptions and QR codes to videos because I learned better from watching a video. Some folks learn better from

reading or looking at a picture. And so we offer those different like modifications or offerings within the book. There's also a whole section on labor. So how do you move your body during labor? How do you do different positions to create different types of space within your pelvis? What are some counter pressure techniques that you can do? So we include some comfort techniques. We include labor positions. We have a whole section on birth

prep. And then there's one small chapter on early postpartum recovery so that you have like a guide on what to do to help you after you give birth. So, yeah, so it's a it's it's designed for the athlete, but anybody could use it technically. But the reviews are you have to be an athlete to do this. But yeah, I mean, it's made for an athlete. That's what the cover says. Yeah, no, kudos to the athletes for sure. That actually spawned another

question. So as an athlete, I mean you, you're typically in tune with your body. You know what feels right, you know what doesn't feel right, and you kind of adjust accordingly. Same is true in labor. Do you have an opinion on this? Might be controversial, but like those that opt for the epidural and things like that, if you're losing sensation in certain regions you may not be able to make those manipulations on the fly as well because you've lost feeling.

So you'd have a thought on that one way or the other. So there is some nuance to it as well. Just kind of like everything. I'm not anti epidural and I'm not like everybody needs to give birth without medication. I do think that there is benefit to giving birth unmedicated or without any sort of pain medication. And I do think that you you keep more intuition with you when you

don't have pain relief. So one thing that happens during labor is as your baby is kind of descending and moving through your pelvis, you will just intuitively move in a way that

creates space for them, which is incredible. I've witnessed this and like pretty much all of the bursts that I've supported where somebody does not have an epidural yet, they will kind of move in a very subtle way that's creating the space that their baby needs. And this one lets me know when there's issues. So I can offer more movement recommendations or we can try to address it before it becomes more of an issue.

But it also really helps their babies kind of navigate through the pelvis a little bit more easily if there is an issue. It's also much easier to address it with movement when you don't have an epidural because you can move much more easily. Now if somebody has been laboring for a really long time and they are exhausted to the point where they're labour's starting to stall out or they are fighting all of their contractions like they cannot release to them.

This is where epidrals can be good tools. And so I like to think about like birth interventions and options as tools that are available to us if we need them or we want them, not necessarily like like mandatory for everyone to get, but also like not an option for everybody either. Like we should explore them as we need. And so if you were exhausted or you were fighting your contractions, this is where a patrols can be a really good

tool. Or if you're starting to develop a complication that maybe may lead to AC section, like you're starting to have more of a fever or like babies starting to get into more distressed. Like these could be reasons to consider an epidural because we would like you to be awake if you have AC section, if you want, if you want to be awake, that ideally most people want to be awake when their babies are

born. And so if it seems like maybe we're heading towards an emergency, this is where an epidural may also be a good option as well so that you can be awake for that. But typically what I'm normally going to see is someone's really tired. They've been laboring for three days and their contractions are totally spacing out and they're exhausted. Well, let's get an epidural. Let's get a good nap, and then we'll probably wake up and be 10 centimeters.

And that's usually what happens if somebody is fighting all their contractions. So they're kind of like stuck at a certain dilation for a really long time. Maybe we should get an epidural and then we can relax. And then usually like they relax and then they're 10 centimeters. So those would be like two instances where I say an epidural. The benefit may outweigh the benefit of having that intuition and that freedom of movement.

Yeah. And then it's also just your own comfort in the experience that you're wanting. If you if you don't want to feel contractions so that doesn't feel important to you, then don't feel contractions. So I think it is personal preference for me, my personal preference was to give birth unmedicated. I found that it allowed me to be more connected to my body. I felt like my recovery was easier. I had an epidural for my first to my next three.

I gave birth at home. I felt more connected to my body. I felt more connected to my baby. I can actually feel my beauty like moving through my body and made pushing a lot easier for me. So I felt really empowered from giving birth on medicated, but I also had uncomplicated laborers. There was no like issues during my laborers to where like I would have considered 1. So I'm not anti epidural. I do think there's a lot of benefit to giving birth without

an epidural. And so if that is something that somebody is wanting, it's OK that you don't get a trophy for doing it. Like there's still benefit to giving birth without an epidural. And I'm like fully supportive of folks whatever they want to do. But yeah, that would be, my general opinion is if you want to stay connected to your body and you want to move more easily to address issues, give birth without medication and do a lot

of prep work to do that. So giving birth without pain relief requires a lot of mental prep because it's hard. It's not the most painful thing I've ever done, but it's one of the hardest things I've ever done in my life. And this is where leaning on your partner for support is incredibly important. And then having a supportive team is incredibly important so that you stay in a good mental space. Because it's, yeah, I would recommend it if somebody wants it.

I think you're more connected, but it's not. I don't think it's mandatory. Yeah, no, I totally agree on our fronts. But now I've got to ask, what is the most painful thing you've ever done? I had like a kidney stone once and I was, like, vomiting from that. That was the worst thing ever. It only lasted for like 30 minutes. But I was like, if this is what labor is like, I cannot do that. Yeah, I know. Labor is just like, it's like a tight and then release the tights and release.

It's just kind of this like ebb and flow. And then you're like in a good like mental space with like your team and and then you're like, all right, I don't want to do this anymore. Then your baby's falling out of you and you're like, I guess I don't have choices. But yeah, that kidney cell that I had one time was like the worst pain I've ever felt in my life.

Yeah, I would. Maybe labor is one of the hardest, is maybe the hardest thing I've done, but it's not the most painful thing that I've done, which I think is a distinction. Now you, you're a wealth of knowledge, Gina for sure. I mean, for me, just going to those with my wife, I mean, she's diving super deep into it has since she was pregnant with her first. And it's like, there's so much information out there and the general public doesn't know a lot of it.

Like it's not common knowledge as far as like the nutritional manipulations you can make, as far as the, you know, habits, routines, mobility work you can do as far as what standard practice in the hospital setting versus a home birth setting. There's like just a whole world of different options out there that I feel like everybody that's thinking about having a kid would benefit from brushing up on learning. So thank you for doing exactly what you're doing there.

Where Where do people go to get the book? They can grab wherever they buy books from. So like Amazon, Barnes and Noble's website, I think you can only get it online right now, but the book is called training for two. And you can also learn more from us on like our Instagram. We have a YouTube channel all it's called all Mama Stay Fit or it's like Namaste but with an M at the front. Like Mama Stay fit. You can find us on Instagram. On YouTube.

We have a podcast called the Mama Stay Fit podcast, which is really heavy on like the birth and the postpartum time frame. But we do bring some experts on to talk about pelvic floor work and chiropractor and all that good stuff, but offer tons of free content. We also offer our paid courses with our childbirth education course and our fitness programs. If you don't want to reinvent the wheel, we've done it for you both for pregnancy and for the postpartum.

We're definitely a little heavy on the athlete side because I'm

an athlete and I wanted a program that I could do during both phases. But we accommodate our programs to where like really anybody could join them. Awesome. And you're doing this alongside with your sister? Yes. She is a labor and delivery nurse and she's a student midwife, so she's almost done with her midwifery degree. So we've got a good blend between the two of us with the fitness birth doula side and then the more medical side.

We balance each other really well to provide really hopefully somewhat unbiased, like care for our followers and for our patients and clients. He was ultimately like, I don't want to force you to do something that doesn't vibe with you just because it worked better for me. Like that's, that's not a good way to approach it. That's not a good way to be a supportive person in this space. And so we do a good job of balancing each other. She's a little bit heavier on the medical side.

I'm a little bit more on the holistic side. And we kind of bring each other to the center so that we provide judgement, free care for people that want to work with us. No, that's, that's awesome. I mean, just speaking from experience, like having a good team is worth its weight in gold. So y'all sound like a super awesome duo. So I mean, shoot, I would, I would vouch for that and anybody should should benefit or would benefit from having somebody like you on their corner for

sure. Awesome. Well, thank you for having me. I really appreciate it. Appreciate you, Jenny. Take care.