How challenging is your pregnancy yoga class?

[sycamore54321]

I did prenatal yoga in my first pregnancy with a hyper-cautious teacher who barely had us do anything, it seems. I've signed up to a different class now in my second pregnancy and it seems the teacher and expectations are much more ambitious with far less caution. Today we were doing poses like the various warriors, etc, with seemingly no adaptations for pregnancy. Based on my previous cautious teacher, I was doing the minimal version of these poses and really not coming anywhere remotely close to my full capacity or limits. I wonder though if my original teacher was wildly overstating the effects of relaxin and the risks of stretching too far, and whether I should just go with the flow of my new class to get a genuine benefit from it. I have no history of SPD or similar.

So my question is what others' experiences of prenatal yoga have been and how cautious or otherwise it are with it. I do feel like a nice semi-challenging class would have greater benefits in terms of actually making a difference to my body but I'm half-terrified of injury either.

I think you should talk to her about your personal needs and limits.

We did warrior poses when I went to pregnancy yoga. There are some poses that should definitely be avoided in pregnancy but your teacher should know about these. I take it she is fully trained in pregnancy yoga? Just do what you're comfortable with. If something doesn't feel right then ask her to modify for you

Apparently she is indeed fully trained and just back from maternity leave herself. My problem about my personal limits is I don't quite know what they are, and how influenced I've been by my frankly fairly useless first set of classes a few years ago where most of the time we just did relaxation! I enjoy physical activity but obviously don't want to risk injury so I'm trying to figure out if my new class is perfectly reasonable for pregnancy or if the teacher is outlandishly demanding and taking far too many risks. So interesting to know that other classes do regular warrior for example also.

Yep we did loads of warrior, cat stretches, tree pose. It's been a couple of years now so can't remember what else. If you start to feel pain or discomfort then definitely stop a move and tell her so she can give you a modification to try

When I first started pregnancy yoga at about 6.5 months I thought it was very basic and really didn't get how it was helping (I had been doing gym type personal training until then). 8 weeks or so later after the same identical class - no adjustments really suggested for for different stages beyond 'just go as far as you feel comfortable' I ended up with serious pelvic pain. I haven't been back.
To be honest given the total lack of personalisation and 'staging' of the class for different stages of pregnancy or correction of any poses I might as well have been watching a DVD. Really wouldn't bother at all again in future. There probably are good classes with knowledgeable instructors out there but I've no idea how to find one and I'm not doing it by trial and error with my body again.

Inverted poses (downward dog etc) would be a big no I believe. Anything that would normally involve looking up to the ceiling I believe we modified to look straight ahead (prevent dissiness), not lying on back (without pillow under right hip) or front, deep twists (although we did gentle twists I think). I'm not a yoga teacher or expert, this is just going off memory so please double check this. If you're concerned your midwife may be able to advise on what you should be avoiding
You can still feel a nice stretch but don't try to push yourself into a pose you're not comfortable with like you might do if you weren't pregnant

That's a shame DR WHY. They really should have catered to all stages and abilities by working in to poses stage by stage, giving modifications/alternatives such as how to use a chair or ball for poses if they're too uncomfortable on the floor etc. Suppose it must differ a great deal between teachers

We do downward dog and warrior poses. Most yoga poses are fine during pregnancy but you need to listen to your body: any discomfort then stop straight away.