This information was put together by Yvonne Moore, YogaBirth teacher and Active Birth teacher trainer for over 25 years. Throughout history women have used herbs to aid childbirth and Raspberry leaf tea is a universal remedy for easing childbirth…Read more
Jill Benjoya Miller discusses the benefits of yoga during pregnancy – with thanks to The Practising Midwife, Britain’s best-selling monthly journal for midwives, where this article was first published.
Lolly Stirk has been teaching yoga for 40 years in West London. She spearheaded the development of yoga for pregnancy and postnatal yoga in the 1970’s and is the co-founder of YogaBirth – with thanks to Yoga & Health magazine where this article was first published.
The Birth Ball is a valuable tool, which can help you remain in control during labour. Its unique design provides physical support for you in pregnancy, labour and the postnatal period. It is an excellent alternative to a chair for sitting and can also be used in a dynamic way to practise exercises and positions in preparation for labour. At the same time it induces a sense of calm and relaxation. Working with the ball helps to move your baby into the best possible position prior to and/or during labour. Such a position favours an easier and shorter labour. The beauty of the ball is its simplicity: it is comfortable, fun and easy to use.
How the Ball Works
The ball can be used in many ways but essentially it provides support. For example, when sitting astride the ball, there is no muscle tension because the thighs and perineum are supported by the gentle counter pressure from the ball. The feet are firmly grounded, and the spine will naturally adopt a position of good alignment. At the same time the muscles supporting the spine strengthen over time. Thus the incidence of pain in the lower back and pelvic joints decreases. In addition the ball appears to enhance the tone of the abdomen and support the pelvic floor, already under strain during pregnancy.
Before you Begin
Birthing balls are available in several sizes but the most common is the 65cm, (this is for someone with a height of up to 175 cm or 5 ft.9 ins. which should be inflated to no more than a height of 65 cm or 25.5 inches. Measure 65cm on the wall with a ruler and pump the ball up to this level.
The ball can be inflated with compressed air from a garage. Or with a foot or hand pump, such as you would use for an airbed. The ball should feel firm but give a little when you sit on it. However, it may soften a little over time so remember to check and pump it up again when necessary.
As you sit on the ball, keep your legs open with your feet firmly resting on the ground. Your hips should be significantly higher than your knees with thighs turned in the same direction as your feet. Make sure your knees are directly over your ankles.
Other sizes of ball include (Height, Ball size, Inflation, Height):
This ball can support (880 lbs) (62.8 stone) or (400 Kgs) however if the surface of the ball is scratched, cut or punctured or damaged its integrity can be lost and the ball can burst instantly. So balls do need to be cleaned and checked regularly. Cleanse with antibacterial soap/cleansing agent.
Use during Pregnancy
Use during Labour
After the Birth
The First Few Days
Pelvic Floor Exercises
Other Postnatal Uses
For Midwives
In The same way the ball if properly inflated can bring support and comfort to the spine, the ball can be a useful seat for a midwife attending a home or hospital birth so that she can sit and observe the labouring woman.
YogaBirth 2006
www.yogabirth.org
References
Anderson T. (1998) Me and my birth ball The Practising Midwife September 1998 vol 1 no9 pp38
Johnston J. (1997) Big Balls and Birthing Australian College of Midwives (Victorian Branch) Open Line
Winter 1997 vol 5 no3 pp7
Perez P.G. (2000) Birth Balls: use of physical therapy balls in maternity care Cutting Edge Press
Pucher M. Guide to the exercises with the Original PEZZI ball Ledragomma
Shallow H. (2003) My rolling programme: The birth ball: ten years experience of using the physiotherapy ball for labouring women MIDIRS Midwifery Digest vol 13 no1 March 2003 pp28-30
Stocker Margarethe (2003) Lead Physiotherapist, Royal Cornhill Hospital, Aberdeen
Sutton J. (2001) Let Birth be Born Again Birth Concepts UK
Introduction
The new guidelines for teaching yoga to pregnant women were launched in February 2010 by Yoga Scotland (www.yogascotland.org.uk) These were written in conjunction with YogaBirth (www.yogabirth.org.uk) and, as a member of both organisations, I was invited to lead the project. In a previous article I summarised and introduced the background to these guidelines. Below follows a more in depth explanation of some of the recommendations.
Grounding, the Breath and the Pregnant Woman
Over millennia our bodies have evolved in the context of gravity and the downward force it exerts upon us toward the Earth. Hence we have developed a musculo-skeletal system that allows us to walk, run or jump when we wish. When this action is not required we can rest by releasing any tension simply by giving weight to our bones. We can do this when standing, sitting, lying down, inverted or resting on all fours. This is grounding.
The problem we face as yoga teachers is that many women choose to take up yoga for the first time when they are pregnant. If, as for many women today, their lifestyle has been predominantly sedentary, they may have developed certain habitual tendencies e.g. to tilt the pelvis in a particular way when standing or sitting, to be generally weak in their core muscles as a result of lack of attention to posture etc. The hormones of pregnancy and the added weight tend to exaggerate these tendencies which can in turn lead to stress and strain upon different joints causing discomfort and pain. Grounding and posture therefore are fundamental to a sound yoga practice.
When we stand grounded in Tadasana there is some tone in the abdominal muscles but this is part of the natural response to gravity. It is not artificially held (Blackaby 2009). The pelvis, the main weight bearing structure of the body, distributes the force through the bones of the legs so we can give weight to the feet – the heels, the inner and outer foot. The arches within the foot respond to create support which is mirrored within the diaphragms above, notably the pelvic and thoracic diaphragms. Tone is brought to the pelvic floor and breathing is distributed between the chest and the belly.
Once we start to tighten the belly and the pelvic floor deliberately, we begin to interfere with this natural process and breathing becomes less responsive to gravity. Through regular practice, yoga can change unhelpful habitual patterns of breathing. We begin to notice the more subtle shifts in our breathing as we move from each asana to the next (Blackaby 2009).
This is crucial for the pregnant woman. She needs to discover how the power of the breath can lead her, for example, from a state of rest in deep relaxation to a flowing movement with typical responsive breathing as the surges of energy from the womb signal the contractions of labour. Finally it is through the help of gravity that she will give birth.
Narrow versus Wide-Angle Standing: the dilemma
The wider stances seen in many of the standing asanas practised today in the West require closer scrutiny when considering the needs of the pregnant woman and her softer, heavier body. If we take the legs into a basic wide stride stance, we may see that for many people the wider the legs are taken apart, the further forward the pelvis has a tendency to tilt. This tendency resides in tension held in the pubofemoral ligaments and the pectineus muscles as the legs are taken wider (Blackaby 2005). For the pregnant woman whose pelvis will gradually tilt forward as her pregnancy progresses, this posture could lead to unhelpful compression of the lumbar spine with pressure on the nerves as they emerge from that part of the spine. Practising wide stance poses could actually increase the cause and symptoms of back pain in pregnancy.
Warrior
If we then turn the feet in a wide stance, as for Virabhadrasana I, the anterior tilt may further increase, particularly if there is tension in the iliopsoas muscle. Tightness in this muscle is a common feature of a sedentary lifestyle where the hip remains flexed for prolonged periods in the sitting position. This version of Virabhadrasana could result in simply more lumbar compression.
More problems emerge from this posture as the woman attempts to draw the pelvis around to face the front leg leaving the back foot turned out. This sets up a twisting force through that back leg which in turn is transmitted through the knee joint. As the joints of pregnant women soften in response to the hormonal effects of pregnancy, this movement becomes particularly hazardous. Add to this the fact that grounding becomes increasingly more difficult the wider the legs are taken, we begin to see collapsing of the foot arch in the back foot, a situation which is hard to resolve until the stance becomes narrower.
A more sensible approach would be achieved by taking the feet a walking pace apart with both feet and pelvis facing in the same direction. Grounding is achieved more easily through the back foot and so the arch of the foot is able to retain its support. Any rotational forces within the knee joint are removed and in fact we now have a healthy stretch introduced to the Achilles tendon of the back leg, a stretch which is not present when the foot is turned out (Blackaby 2005). This healthy stretch is particularly helpful to the pregnant woman as it is one of the ways well known to physiotherapists and pregnancy yoga teachers of pre-empting and counteracting the uncomfortable and often painful leg cramps characteristic of pregnancy.
Warrior poses are synonymous with power and strength. Women can access these aspects of the pose in a practice that is both connected to the ground and the breath, while at the same time integrated with the response of the spine and the pregnant body. A safe practice evolves so that women can access the gentle confidence and feminine grace of a healthy pregnancy.
Helpline and Updates
We were very keen when we wrote these guidelines that they should be kept up to date in line with the evidence available. There is an e-mail Helpline that can be accessed to contact either myself judycameron@yogabirth.plus.com or Kay Kay.Millar@virgin.net . In pursuit of the very best we can offer pregnant women, we welcome your questions, your comments and your ideas.
Judy Cameron
April 2010
For more information about how to train as a YogaBirth teacher, please visit www.yogabirth.org.uk or contact either Judy or Kay via the Helpline.
Active Birth is an essential dimension to pregnancy. Many of us are familiar with the concept of Active Birth. To midwives it often conjures up images of women adopting upright positions for labour and birth. To the women and many childbirth educators the concept may spill out beyond the physical, and the implication of becoming active in mind takes on new meaning.
In actual fact the term Active Birth was first coined by Janet Balaskas in the late 1970’s as a then reaction against the highly interventionist management of labour with drugs that had, at the time, become very fashionable within the world of obstetrics. Women frequently gave birth on their backs in order to facilitate the monitoring and procedures surrounding birth. However, many of us forget that until the mid twentieth century – when the majority of births in the UK took place at home – the majority of women gave birth on their left side. Interestingly this is a far superior position within which to give birth – first because it is considerably less painful and second because the statistical chance of tearing is significantly reduced.
I first started to question the whole birth ritual as a student nurse in 1977. I spent 12 weeks in the maternity wing of a general hospital. In the Labour Ward I witnessed births that were highly managed with epidurals and drugs to induce the process – and I also saw women giving birth almost without any help at all. There were the sweetest of midwives caring for them – and there were also the most terrifying. It was the terror that drove me to give up the place I had been offered to do my midwifery training. It would not be for another 24 years before I actually became a midwife.
After many years of working as a nurse, when I became pregnant with my first child I started to practise yoga. This was triggered by Janet Balaskas’ Active Birth Handbook which my best friend gave to me with the recommendation “..this is all you need. Don’t read any other book.” And she was absolutely right. Everything in that book made total sense to me. I practised yoga. I swam. I rested. I went for walks. Everything I did for myself, I did for my baby. In my husband’s eyes I was beautiful – and I felt beautiful. I also felt strong and powerful. I was so happy. And it was in this state of happiness that I went into labour and had what I could only describe at the time as “the most beautiful experience ever”. Not surprisingly I had a similar, albeit much quicker, birth the second time at home – kneeling on the floor, resting my arms over two enormous floor cushions wedged into the sofa.
I could have gone on giving birth over and over because I had enjoyed it so much but instead I decided to train as an Active Birth Teacher with Janet Balaskas . I wanted to be able to pass on this knowledge to other women. The direction I took eventually led me into midwifery and then on to becoming a British Wheel Module Provider for the Pregnancy Module and the YogaBirth Course Director.
Since I first began this work nearly 20 years ago, I have noticed the proliferation of courses in Yoga for Pregnancy, Mindfulness-based childbirth, Hypnosis for childbirth, Hypnobirthing and so on. Indeed I have trained in meditation, hypnosis and HypnoBirthing myself. They are all valid and wonderful ways to prepare for the birth of a new life and I celebrate and rejoice in the fact that there are so many.
All these approaches recognise a dimension to pregnancy and birth that is so often missing in a standard antenatal class. Any yoga teacher in Scotland with a strong commitment to helping women in this wonderfully active way, might like to consider the British Wheel Pregnancy Module which commences in Dundee in June 2014.
Practice these every day
Cat Marjariasana/Bidalasana
Free the pelvis with the breath and explore the possibilities of movement
Hare Pose Shashankasana
Exhale into the back of your pelvis and be easy with the space across your sacrum
Child’s Pose Balasana/Pranatasana
As you exhale, allow the active weight of the pelvis to lengthen the spine through from the shoulders, the upper back, the waist – to the tailbone
Be comfortable with the sacred space within yourself
Judy Cameron January 2013