Your Postpartum Body written by Courtney Naliboff and Ruth Macy is an empowering book about the remarkable transformation your body makes after carrying a baby.
Like Courtney and Ruth, I experienced a traumatic birth and was then left wondering what to do. I sought out many experts and with their guidance and through my yoga practice I allowed my new postpartum body to heal. What I would have given for a book like this with information pertaining to all the things I needed to know.
Over these postpartum years, my yoga and meditative practices have helped me during this transition to: take it slow, give myself grace, heal my Diastasis Recti (Known as DR – this is where the central connective line of fascia between your right and left ab stretches creating a physical gap where one did not exist before.), manage my breath, rebuild a more physical practice and recognize the need for rest.
This time of healing has given me pause in relation to working as a Yoga Instructor to postpartum bodies. Before becoming one myself, I did have a basic awareness of postpartum bodies but not as much as I should have. For example: I was aware of DR but not that 2/3 of postpartum bodies experience it – nor that many of those bodies aren’t aware. If someone is unaware of an injury there is no way that a teacher can help with modifications. The breath creates a lot of pressure in the container of the torso and if a DR exists much of that pressure will drop down into the bowl of the pelvis. There are so many poses in yoga that are just fine but there are others that create additional pressure. That is why a good rule of thumb is to enter poses slowly, mindfully and at the beginning in a modified inquisitive way.
These are all things I personally felt into. Then learned about through study. Then corrected through a myriad of practices that rebuilt my core. And like with many things that happen to me (like perimenopause) I think that this must be happening to other people. I certainly cannot be the only one.
I am grateful to Courtney and Ruth for starting this postpartum conversation in such a powerful way. That my thoughts on yoga were included makes my heart feel full in the most delicious way.
Now GO BUY THAT BOOK!!!! Your Postpartum Bodyis available wherever books are sold.