to exercise sooner than 6wks after birth...?

[teamyellow]

DD is 2wks and I'm feeling great, so have started gentle workouts. DH told me I shouldn't be doing anything and, having googled, I'm now freaking myself out that I've destroyed everything inside...

My bleeding's tapering off (not getting redder like I read it would if I was over-doing things), I'm warming up properly and keeping well hydrated.

I exercised throughout my pregnancy, up until the day I went into labour, so I'm in pretty good shape, and DD's birth was very straightforward - no drugs, vaginal, no tearing.

Please reassure me that as long as I feel ok, I probably am??! Am starting to feel an utter fool.

I would be careful. I exercised every day throughout pregnancyyoga, swimming, pilates, TRX, and I've been a serious runner for yearsbut even I waited until six weeks (long walks aside).

What exercise are you doing?
You need to be careful as your tendons weaken suring pregnancy so you are more susceptible to knee injuries. Also your pelvic floor needs to strengthen up again before doing anything like abs or running. Take it very very easy

YANBU. If you feel ok, then you probably are, as you say.

It's six weeks for a reason and birth is a biiiiggg shock to the system. Your muscles need to heal as well

Stick to walking with the pram I think.

I'm sure you won't have done any damage, and given you sound really fit you are probably fine but go easy on yourself

I am rather amazed and you have the energy tbh. DS is 16 months and I've still not been back to the gym

Congratulations on your DD

Legally you can go back to work after 14 days. Six weeks is the recommended rest these days. Thereafter life should resume as normal.

I'd wait. Why do you want to do it? Is it habit or are you unhappy with how you look?

I would just focus on walking with the pram. Still works really well for weight loss but you won't be straining your body too much.

I exercised early after the birth of all three of my children - am a runner, very fit and ran thru pregnancies. However, I wish I hadn't! Now have a weak pelvic floor and I think this was the cause.
If you need to exercise - and I know that craving - why not do some sit ups to build arm strength or get some weights and do upper body.

Sit ups to build core strength

Noooo don't do sit ups. Your ab muscles will still be fucked and need time to rejoin. I think a bit of gentle cardio is prob fine but may be best to take it easy until the recommended 6 weeks are up

Thanks for the understanding - thought I'd be flamed and thought an idiot...

It's habit rather than anything else - quite happy with how I look. Have some weight to drop but nothing major and I know it'll go in time. But I love to exercise :)

Focusing on upper body is good advice - that'll still give me the boost I get from exercise without the pelvic floor/straining risks... And where we live is hilly so pushing the buggy is cardio enough.

Brisk walking with the pram is great exercise - I lost all my baby weight within a few weeks with both of my DCs by doing that.

I don't imagine many of us here are medically qualified in post natal care, so it might be worth just following the expert's guidelines for another few weeks?

Definitely don't do situps!

Give your joints and the rest of you time to get the hormone 'relaxin' out of your system (AFAIK this is the main reason why exercise is not recommended until after six weeks PP). Until that happens you are far more flexible than usual and you run the risk of doing yourself an injury.

Cross-posted with you there. Yes you are totally right that if you feel fine, you ARE fine. I hurt my back about a week after DD was born (I was just pushing a toy out of the way with my foot for heaven's sake) and believe me I knew all about it immediately!

Long walks are great and have the added bonus that your baby usually gets some good sleep while you're pushing them around.

no sleep at all meant no exercise for about 9 months. Thing is I am fit again now. Why not enjoy a rest? You have done something quite major to your body and it would probably be best for you to respect it a bit?

Don't do any abdominal exercises until your muscles have knitted back together.

I can't remember the technical details, but the muscles split down the centre to allow the pregnancy, and if you exercise before they have repaired themselves you can end up with permanent damage, and a sticky out tummy!

Someone will no doubt come along to rephrase this in a more correct way.

CointreauVersial no need for anybody to rephrase it, you've explained it perfectly .

My youngest is 4yo. Does this mean I'm now OK to start doing situps? Would love it if somebody could find some medical reason to explain why it's still dangerous...

Ligaments etc still affected by relaxin so chances of damage.

Separated tummy muscles need extremely gentle exercise - if you google it you can get the exercises recommend.

Pelvic floor - maybe jogging and bouncing you internal organs on it with all that relaxin and stress it is under would possibly not be good - do pelvic floor exercises

Stick to gentle stuff - pregnancy yoga for core strength at a push but check with hv first.

Walking with the pram is nice but the weather is crap.

It's something like diastis recti - I have it badly and hernia :( getting op in april :(

Can you join a post natal Pilates course? I did that from about 6 weeks post natal, I took the DTs with me and it was really good for strengthening the core muscles back up again. Also I did a "buggyfit" class from about 12 weeks until I went back to work at 10 months. Is there anything like that near you? They are specifically tailored for recent mums so won't do any exercises that may damage your abdominals (like crunches do apparently)

I did walking and very gentle horse riding from two weeks after birth - but neither of those involved any sudden movements or much stress on any joints. It was enough to keep me sane, but not enough to do any harm iyswim. So you can exercise, just gently.

I was given exercises by Physio to start 24 hours after c-section. They were v basic core ones.

After about 2 weeks after my DD was born I got back into my insane cleaning habits, lots of bending, stretching, actually quite vigorous. My bleeding had almost stopped so thought it would be fine. I then went to the loo one evening, stood up and passed massive blood clot and passed out. I was told it was due to too much exertion.

So, moral of the story, even if your bleeding has almost stopped, it means bugger all. Don't do anything!

I think it's down to how you feel, I played a competitive rugby match 2 weeks after giving birth and it was fine. It's an individual thing, I couldn't wait to get back out to sport having missed it for 6 months. I did ask the doctor before I did this, and he checked my stomach muscles were fine. I did keep fit during pregnancy too, mainly swimming because I had to give up contact sports. I felt my ligaments were quite flexible afterwards so did take it fairly easy and found it wasn't until about 6 months later that I felt completely back to normal again.

If you have any spare time, run yourself a bath/get some sleep! There's plenty of time for exercising in a few weeks, wait until everythings gone back to normal inside.
I doubt you've done any harm, but no point in rushing it.