Breathing & Labor Preparation

With this pregnancy, I’ve really come to like 10-minute workouts that I just find on YouTube. Considering my gym is now my basement at 5:30am, I have to do something to mix things up. These are doable and keep me entertained. Note: Dr. Husband doesn’t love all of the exercises in these videos, so he has suggested modifications to them to keep me safe.

But my main point in telling you this is that during a recent 10-minute yoga video from Katy Appleton yoga, I remembered the importance of breathing in terms of labor preparation.

Here’s the video:

I guess she just struck a chord with me in terms of embracing the pain and breathing into and through it. 

Proper Breathing
When I talked with Dr. Husband about how I think I need to work on this again, he used it as a teachable moment. According to him, proper respiration occurs when all sections of the diaphragm contract together as one unit. This flattens the diaphragm and increases intra-abdominal pressure. As you breathe and push, if you have a diaphragm that is strengthened and functions properly, you’ll have more intra-abdominal pressure pushing down.

With improper function of the diaphragm the muscle contracts mostly toward your back, and pushes your intra-abdominal pressure more forward verses down toward your pelvis. This is not ideal for pushing out a baby.

Practice
To practice proper breathing:

1. Put your fingers on your belly, and your thumb in the space between your pelvis and ribs on your back, so you’re digging your hands into the soft spot on your back and your belly. 
2. As you breathe in, your waist should expand out into your fingers and your thumb. The ribs can expand out in all directions, but they shouldn’t move up. When most people take a deep breath in, they suck their belly in and lift their ribs up; however, we want to do the opposite. We want to expand the ribs and belly and not move the ribs up. 
3. After you’ve gotten the hang of this, be mindful of the feeling when you work out and practice it. You’ll be thankful you did if it means a few less pushes! 

(PS: Dr. Husband said to note in this post that this function of your core/diaphragm is also the only way you’ll ever use your glutes and pelvic floor correctly...it's important!)