Exercising Safely Following Delivery

It is very important to begin exercising as soon as you safely can following delivery to help you regain your pre-pregnancy stamina and strength. In addition, exercising can help you feel more energetic despite a newborn that cannot sleep through the night.

It can also speed your recovery from delivery in many other ways. One of the trickiest questions to answer is when can you safely exercise without risk for complications.

This answer to this question varies from woman to woman, but it is important for you to find the answer to this question yourself. In general, you can exercise when you feel you are up to it as long as you do not have any serious complications and if you delivered a normal birth.

However, your doctor may advise you to wait until your six week checkup so that they can make sure that you have healed properly and fully before you begin a workout routine. Most of the time, you can safely perform the work out that you have been performing throughout your pregnancy, as long as you have been working out throughout your pregnancy.

Again, you must have had a normal delivery and be free of complications. In the beginning, you will not want to jump into your pre-pregnancy, hard running routine.

Instead, you will want to begin with something lighter to see how it goes. Listen to your body and if it seems like it is okay with the work you are doing, you can slowly increase the intensity and the difficulty.

Some forms of light exercise that you may want to participate in include walking, push-ups, stretching, and so forth. A c-section is a different matter entirely.

If you delivered through c-section, you will be required to wait between six and eight weeks to exercise. It is important that you make sure your abdomen has healed enough before you begin putting it under stress.

Even though you should wait six to eight weeks for any other type of exercise, most doctor recommend for otherwise healthy women to go on a short, slow walk every day. An easy walk can help get the blood flowing enough that the healing process will stimulated and the blood clots will be prevented.

Other complications can also be avoided by walking at an easy pace when you feel up to it. If you did not exercise throughout your pregnancy or if you performed less as you neared delivery, you will want to make sure that you start out slowly.

Even though you do not have to worry about harming your baby anymore, it is still critically important to take proper care of yourself. Start out slowly and be very careful not to push yourself too hard.

It is important that you check with your doctor to make sure that you are ready to exercise as well. As you begin to increase the intensity that you are performing at, it is a good idea to keep in mind that your joints and ligaments will be loose for three to five months following delivery.

As a result, you will be more prone to losing your balance and falling down. Make sure that you are careful so that you do not injure yourself.

If you plan to take an exercise class to get back into shape, you may want to consider asking to see if there is a postpartum specialist who may be able to help you focus on regaining your former strength in a safe manner. However, if there is not a specialist available, you will want to select a class that is very low impact and which focuses on toning and stretching rather than more intense cardiovascular types of working out.

Even though working out is good for you in most ways, overdoing it will not be good for you. Be patient with yourself, allow yourself to heal and take it slowly.

Not only do you need to heal, but you will need to adjust physically and mentally to having a new baby to take care of. Be sure to spend time with your baby and bonding with him or her.

One area of your body that you will need to particularly careful to take care of is your abdomen muscles. These muscles will not fully return to their original positions until somewhere between four and eight weeks.

If you perform abdominal strengthening exercises before this gap closes, then you may injure them and make it harder to strengthen them later when they have healed. It is important to make sure you are ready before you begin exercising too strenuously.

Terry Daniels is a personal trainer and has authored hundreds of articles relating to health and fitness. He recommends (http://www.nordictrack.com) for your personal training needs.