After giving birth for the first time, my body took time to heal. (That picture above is me with teeny tiny 2 weeks old baby Milly). Growing a human inside my body and then pushing her out into the world was a new experience for me. As a result, I had all kinds of pain I’d never had before. It took me over a week before I could even walk up the stairs again.
Needless to say, I didn’t move my body more than getting up to go to the bathroom and lifting my tiny baby to nurse her for over 2 weeks and then after that, it took me a little longer to get back on my mat.
This is normal. Rest is good.
And so is movement.
After giving birth the 2nd and 3rd time, I allowed myself to move a little sooner. Slowly and mindfully.
My body healed faster. I had a lot less pain.
The most nagging postpartum pain I experienced, other than uterus and pelvic discomfort, was low back pain. Mostly it was stiffness from sitting and nursing a baby so much. But it was also due to my body shifting from pregnant to birth to postpartum.
Let’s also clear up what postpartum means.
Postpartum is the period of time after you give birth.
The end.
The impact that giving birth makes on your body is not over when you’ve hit some magical or medically determined date.
This means, you can benefit from postpartum-focused movement whether you are 6 days postpartum, 6 weeks postpartum, 6 months postpartum, 6 years postpartum, or 16 years postpartum.
When it comes to postpartum yoga for low back relief what you’re after is this:
✔️ creating some stability for your pelvis
✔️ creating a little connection back to your core muscles
✔️ getting some good length for your side body down into the low back area just above your outer hips.
That will provide some sweet relief from all of the curling over you tend to do in the early days of postpartum as well as when you have to lift sleeping children off of floors, couches, and out of cars.
When I have low back pain, I do practices much like the one I created for my YouTube channel this week. It’s less than 15 minutes long and keeps the movement slow, steady, and supportive to give your low back some sweet relief.
I’ll add one little caveat about postpartum yoga and movement:
Every pregnancy, labor, birth, and postpartum is as different as the women who experience it.
Not every woman will be able to get onto her hands and knees within a few days of giving birth to even do something as gentle as cat/cow.
Please check with your OB or midwife to determine what amount of movement is appropriate for you if you are still in the earlier phases of postpartum.
