Stomach muscles after birth

[Laur89]

Has anyone had damaged stomach muscles after birth? My stomach muscles have separated down the middle after having my second child, both babies quite big. The midwife said it is known as a separated rectus sheath! Just wondering people's experiences of this and tips to rectify it! Thank you :)

Me too! I'm 4 weeks into the exercises on the Every Mother app. You have to pay but it's making a big difference to my stomach! My youngest is 3.5 and I'm on the waiting list for hernia surgery. I'm doing the postnatal exercises at the moment, in a couple of weeks I move up a stage. It's about £60 for a year I think but they do offers and you can buy a 3 month block. It's 10 minutes most days, and 30 minutes occasionally - I usually do it just before bed. Good luck! Mine really has improved a lot.

I've been thinking about this a lot so I'm glad you asked. I have what I call a "W" belly since giving birth. It overhangs (i was overweight before baby) and has a line that goes in in the middle.

A bit like the picture at the top of this page but more severe:

www.babycentre.co.uk/a1052298/your-post-baby-belly-why-its-changed-and-how-to-tone-it

I didn't know if it is an issue from being overweight or something like Diastasis Recti (I think that's the same as a separated rectus sheath).

Thanks for that link hellolittlebaby. My tummy sounds like yours, a W is a good description!

It's called diastasis recti and the NHS has some info on how to assess it.

I had a 4.5 finger gap and it took a year for it to get better. Lots of specialist physio with a women's health Phsyio who gave some great advice but the key for me was losing weight and time. It's still not the same a few years later but doesn't bother me now as it's unnoticeable. I was devastated at the time though and had never heard of it but it's pretty common.

Don't work for the every mother app I promise, and I have been dieting too, but just wanted to show you the difference in 6 weeks. I really recommend the app I feel like my core has really strenthened. I did the 6 week early post partum path (even though youngest DD is almost 4!) am about to move on to the next phase.

I second getting specialist advice, certain exercises can make diastasis recti worse so you need to go to someone trained in how to work with it. Pilates was helpful for me.

Totally agree FamilyTree. The ones I've beem doing are all DR safe and there's been a lot of guidance on what exercises to avoid. I foolishly did some youtube yoga in the summer and made mine so much worse.