How to Maintain a Yoga Practice During Pregnancy

Practicing yoga while pregnant is one of the best ways to keep your body feeling good and your mind in balance. If you’ve never practiced yoga before, start with prenatal yoga only. However, if you’ve been practicing yoga for awhile, you should be able to continue your regular yoga practice with a few modifications.

First Trimester

Hopefully you’re not feeling nauseous during the first trimester! If you are, try to give yoga a chance. You never know – it might alleviate your nausea and help you find a bit of relief. However, this is the time to listen to your body – if relaxation is what you need, accept and embrace that, especially when the risk of miscarriage is the highest. Heat is not recommended at any point during pregnancy, but especially avoid it during the first trimester.

Postures to avoid:

• Any deep twists, including revolved crescent lunge, prayer twist or seated twist.

• Any core work, with the exception of plank or forearm plank.

• Belly-down spine strengthening should be ok – but if it feels uncomfortable toward the end of your first trimester, avoid it altogether (and if you're unsure, check with your doctor).

Embrace grounding postures such as child’s pose, downward facing dog and tree pose. These postures will help your body find a bit of neutrality and stability during a time of constant change.

Second Trimester

At this point, you’ve hopefully overcome the nausea and dizziness that accompanied your first trimester, and chances are you’ll feel a bit more like your normal self. You’ll still want to avoid twists, core work and belly-down spine strengthening, but you can modify these poses with your own variations.

Posture modifications:

• In prayer twist and revolved crescent lunge, keep your torso lifted so it’s perpendicular to your mat, and try opening your arms to move into a vertical twist variation.

• During core, feel free to relax completely, or do your own thing; maybe move into a few sets of light pushups or leg lifts.

• During spine strengthening, try a variation of spinal traction by extending your right arm forward and your left leg back. Hold here and breathe for a few breaths, then draw your elbow to your knee on your exhales four or five times. Then switch sides.

Third Trimester

You’re on the home stretch! At this point, you’re probably starting to feel the fatigue that plagued you during the first few months, so obviously listen to the clues your body is telling you – but again, one or two yoga classes a week might feel really good, and will do wonders to help you prepare for labor.

Postures to embrace:

• Standing wide-legged forward fold (prasarita), seated bound angle pose, and seated wide-legged forward fold are all beneficial at this point in time because they accommodate your growing belly as well as stretch your inner thighs and groins in preparation for labor.

• Downward facing dog is great for anytime during pregnancy, but especially late in the third trimester when the weight of your baby is beginning to put pressure on your cervix.

• Legs-up-the-wall pose is a wonderful way to alleviate leg swelling at this point if you’re comfortable on your back for a few minutes.

Keep in mind that while pregnant, you may experience increased flexibility due to an increase of relaxin in the blood, a hormone that loosens the joints and muscles. You may feel hyper-flexible, but make sure you don’t push any stretches or poses too far.

Also remember every pregnancy and body is different, so it’s important to discuss any changes in your routine with your doctor to make sure it’s right for you. Yoga has been proven to provide a range of benefits for pregnant women, so we hope that it helps provide you with some balance and relief during all stages of your pregnancy.