![[personal profile]](http://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Prenatal Yoga and Maternal Fitness
Jun. 22nd, 2009 02:11 pmWhen I put together my pregnancy bibliography earlier this year, I wrote about a couple of prenatal fitness things I hadn’t tried. Now that I have, I thought I’d do a fuller review.
Prenatal Yoga with Shiva Rea I heart this dvd! I’ve found myself neglecting all the other fitness things I was doing to have more time for it. There are three workouts of about 20 minutes each, followed by a four-minute guided relaxation, so I can do one, two, or all three sessions, depending on how much time I have. There is a model for each trimester, each wearing a different jewel-toned outfit, demonstrating adaptations of the poses for each, though they are still explained verbally as well. The moves seem to hit everything that gets achy or needs extra help during pregnancy – lower and upper back, leg stretches, side stretches, squats and Kegels. To borrow the words of the friend from whom I’m borrowing the dvd, after doing the workout, I go from feeling like I just can’t live in my body anymore to feeling comfortable in it again. The beautiful music and visuals help in making the whole thing feel like something special I’m doing for myself rather than the dull but necessary time that exercise can so easily be.
Maternal Fitness by Julie Tupler, by comparison, covers most of the same bases, with a lot more explanation, but telling you to do a 1-2 hour workout every other day – difficult with a first pregnancy and pretty much impossible with a second. The big difference is the Tupler Technique, Julie Tupler’s special abdominal exercises, the same in both Maternal Fitness and Lose Your Mummy Tummy. These I find really valuable and do just those, and the prenatal yoga. Maternal Fitness comes as either a book or video/dvd. I borrowed the book and video from a friend. They both have a lot of useful information on preparation for birth and selecting a health care professional, though this is available many other places as well. I disagreed with her philosophy on belly breathing – she seems to want a lot of active pushing in and out of the breath, which doesn’t sync well with my Alexander training, but this is easily skipped and the idea of paying attention to breath might be more valuable for someone less musically trained than I.
The video that I saw was the first of two, the first explaining her 15-minute basic daily routine and basic health things and the second about the full hour-plus workout to be done every other day or so. While the information was good, I was frustrated that the exercises in the video were all intercut with lengthy information. I understand the need for explanation, but on a day-to-day basis, I don’t want the 45 minutes of explanation to be talked through the 15 minutes of workout. Perhaps the dvd version would have just a workout segment, and would certainly make it easier to skip, but I found the video version frustrating to work with in this regard. Between the book and the video, then, I’d go with the book.
The book includes both the long and short workouts, and charts to photocopy with pictures and brief explanations of the exercises. It is deeper than the yoga video in that it goes in depth into why she’s having you do what she is, and exactly what bad exercises will do for your body. That’s useful information to have, and makes it easy to modify your own favorite workout for pregnancy. The abdominal work is unique and useful, and the rest of the information in the book is good to read through. The workouts looked to my midwives and me to be good workouts – they just looked to me like less fun than the yoga and perhaps too time-consuming. As that’s entirely a matter of taste, you, gentle reader, might want to look at both.
Prenatal Yoga with Shiva Rea I heart this dvd! I’ve found myself neglecting all the other fitness things I was doing to have more time for it. There are three workouts of about 20 minutes each, followed by a four-minute guided relaxation, so I can do one, two, or all three sessions, depending on how much time I have. There is a model for each trimester, each wearing a different jewel-toned outfit, demonstrating adaptations of the poses for each, though they are still explained verbally as well. The moves seem to hit everything that gets achy or needs extra help during pregnancy – lower and upper back, leg stretches, side stretches, squats and Kegels. To borrow the words of the friend from whom I’m borrowing the dvd, after doing the workout, I go from feeling like I just can’t live in my body anymore to feeling comfortable in it again. The beautiful music and visuals help in making the whole thing feel like something special I’m doing for myself rather than the dull but necessary time that exercise can so easily be. Maternal Fitness by Julie Tupler, by comparison, covers most of the same bases, with a lot more explanation, but telling you to do a 1-2 hour workout every other day – difficult with a first pregnancy and pretty much impossible with a second. The big difference is the Tupler Technique, Julie Tupler’s special abdominal exercises, the same in both Maternal Fitness and Lose Your Mummy Tummy. These I find really valuable and do just those, and the prenatal yoga. Maternal Fitness comes as either a book or video/dvd. I borrowed the book and video from a friend. They both have a lot of useful information on preparation for birth and selecting a health care professional, though this is available many other places as well. I disagreed with her philosophy on belly breathing – she seems to want a lot of active pushing in and out of the breath, which doesn’t sync well with my Alexander training, but this is easily skipped and the idea of paying attention to breath might be more valuable for someone less musically trained than I. The video that I saw was the first of two, the first explaining her 15-minute basic daily routine and basic health things and the second about the full hour-plus workout to be done every other day or so. While the information was good, I was frustrated that the exercises in the video were all intercut with lengthy information. I understand the need for explanation, but on a day-to-day basis, I don’t want the 45 minutes of explanation to be talked through the 15 minutes of workout. Perhaps the dvd version would have just a workout segment, and would certainly make it easier to skip, but I found the video version frustrating to work with in this regard. Between the book and the video, then, I’d go with the book.
The book includes both the long and short workouts, and charts to photocopy with pictures and brief explanations of the exercises. It is deeper than the yoga video in that it goes in depth into why she’s having you do what she is, and exactly what bad exercises will do for your body. That’s useful information to have, and makes it easy to modify your own favorite workout for pregnancy. The abdominal work is unique and useful, and the rest of the information in the book is good to read through. The workouts looked to my midwives and me to be good workouts – they just looked to me like less fun than the yoga and perhaps too time-consuming. As that’s entirely a matter of taste, you, gentle reader, might want to look at both.
Your Best Birth by Ricki Lake and Abby Epstein Lake and Epstein start this positive and empowering look at birth with explaining how even a woman in love with her Tylenol PM could want to try for a natural birth, and their own birth stories. It’s first and foremost about opening up choices about birth, including choosing your place (hospital, birth center or home), care provider (OB, GP or midwife), and back-up team. (They even suggest finding a doula first, who can help you pinpoint your birth style and direct you to doctors and midwives in the area who share your philosophy.) Though they don’t hesitate to point out that the U.S. is at the bottom of the world charts in terms of maternal and infant safety during birth, they focus more on what women can do than on the depressing statistics. They talk about what interventions are out there, risks, and when they are really appropriate. The C-Section chapter talks about both medically unsound reasons to do them as well as ways to make your c-section as gentle as positive as possible if it turns out that you do need one. They talk about communicating with providers and hospital staff, birth for survivors of sexual abuse, different (and more American-focused) birth class/philosophy options, and postpartum care. They include profiles of “birth goddesses”, including birth activists, celebrity moms who opted for natural births, and regular women with amazing births. 
The Complete Book of Pregnancy and Childbirth by Sheila Kitzinger 
The Birth Partner by Penny Simkin When I prepared to give birth, I hired a doula, a professional birth support person. She made a huge difference in making the whole birth experience smoother and more positive, and I recommend hiring a doula to anyone giving birth. But, suppose you can’t hire a doula? Suppose you want your parenting partner or your best friend to come to the birth with you? Or, that such a person wants to educate him or herself to be able to help you even if you have a doula as well. In that case, you want this book. It covers pregnancy, birth and newborn care from the perspective of a partner, rather than the mother or a medical professional. It includes such topics as preparing for labor, helping the mother find an effective labor coping pattern, common medical interventions, their side effects and risks and how to discuss them with hospital staff, what to do if there is a personality conflict between the mother and the assigned nurse or doctor, and how to best support a mother in labor who’s changed her mind about what she wants from her birth plan. I read the old, falling-apart edition that my midwifery still keeps. This edition placed rather more stress on the importance of learning and practicing several breathing patterns than is currently in vogue (my birth class instructor said that practicing breathing before you were in labor was like practicing breathing for a marathon without running); I don’t know if the new edition has changed. Overall, however, the information was extremely helpful. There are even helpful summary pages labeled in white text on darker bars on the sides of pages, so you can fan out the pages and find the part you need in the heat of things. Simkin is the founder of Doulas of North America/DONA, and this book is required reading for many doula training courses as well.
Taking Charge of Your Fertility by Toni Wechsler (note: teen book available, too) This is the classic and recently revised guide to monitoring your own fertility. Most people won’t need anything else. Looking on her web site, I note that she’s also got a book for teen girls, with probably less on getting pregnant and more on understanding your body. 
Getting Pregnant the Natural Way by D.S. Feingold and Deborah Gordon, M.D. I found this book by the very scientific method of pulling all likely-looking books off the library shelf, and then skimming and reading bits to see which one looked best. Plus, of course, already carefully selected by our medical librarian. This book, as well as covering the basics fairly briefly, gives nice coverage of nutrition, herbal therapy, movement, massage and stress reduction for conception. This was my favorite for the even coverage of all kinds of therapies, including when they can be integrated with conventional drug therapy and when it is or isn’t safe to self-medicate. There have a lot of solutions to a lot of specific problems, as well. 
The Vegetarian Mother’s Cookbook by Cathe Olson This cookbook is full of yummy recipes aimed at the pregnant or nursing vegetarian mother. While that group may be small, the recipes are really good, with appeal well beyond the target audience. They are designed for maximum nutritional benefits, with balanced protein, fat, and whole grains, and includes nutritional profiles for all the recipes. (Adding vitamin-rich seaweed mix to nearly everything seemed strange at first, and then we discovered that seaweed is also one of the biggest natural sources of umame – the flavor that MSG recreates without the health benefits.) I was first impressed by the book when, after the usual trope on the importance of breakfast, she actually devoted a full third of the book to breakfast recipes designed to work for busy mornings, including porridges, whole-grain pancakes and waffles, granolas, and breakfasts on the go. Then there are recipes for dinners, snacks, teas, and baked goods and sorbets that will satisfy your cravings without throwing your blood sugar out of whack. The dinners especially include advice on which recipes freeze well and how to bake in small stages throughout the day around baby duties. This is the rare book that we actually bought, because there were so many recipes that looked really good, even to my carnivorous husband – better than beef stew, many variations on lasagna, nori rice balls, and more. And while meatless entrees might not be for everyone, the careful attention to sugar balance makes this an excellent choice for anyone who wants good food that doesn’t compromise on flavor or nutrition.
