Dealing With Diastasis?
Diastasis: when I asked you recently if you were afraid of it during pregnancy, 87% of you said you were.
Please don’t be afraid. You absolutely aren’t broken.
Diastasis is the natural stretching of the linea alba, the connective tissue that connects the abdominals, to make way for your growing baby. It’s also completely natural, with 100% of women in their 3rd trimester having a diastasis. 🤰🏼
How big your diastasis is and how lasting it is is largely down to the size of your bump and genetics. But there are a few things we can do during pregnancy and early postpartum to help optimise our chances of a good functional recovery. 👌🏼
🎓 Keep doing core exercises! Yep! Don’t let the diastasis scare you away from getting a deconditioned core. We are learning more and more these days that ab work as well as loads of other lovely core exercises are safe and now actually recommended. This helps your postpartum recovery to be way quicker.
🎓 Your job is to watch for hard coning/doming of the abdomen. Although we really don’t mind soft coning and please don’t be scared of this (that’s a tent shape that’s soft to touch) we’re still not a fan of hard coning: that’s your body’s way of telling you you’re not maintaining great control across your midsection, and if you’re unable to improve it with a different technique or cue, change it up for a different exercise. ⛺
🎓 If you can, go see a women’s/pelvic health physio. They will be able to assess if you need some extra core exercises or any release work around your abdominal wall (especially if you’re super tight or very developed in your abdomen). This helps you to feel confident about the right ab exercises for you in pregnancy 🎓 💪🏼
Ultimately, the diastasis you are left with postpartum is unlikely to be due to anything you did or didn’t do during pregnancy, so please be kind to yourself ❤️ 🙄
Download our FREE eBook on Diastasis here.
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