It's hard to ignore the health benefits of regular exercises and physical activities in our daily lives. And during pregnancy too, exercise is a must. Maintaining a habit of light exercise and physical activity does wonder to a mother's health.
It lifts up your spirit, boosts metabolism, increases flexibility balancing your emotional and physical changes, and prepare us for a safe and healthy delivery.
So, keeping this in our mind, today we've put up a list of simple and safe exercise routines that are beneficial for all the mothers-to-be.
Simple exercise routine for a healthy pregnancy
Ladies, if you didn't use to exercise before your pregnancy, stop worrying! You can start right now!! You don't have to exhaust yourself and sore your body.
It's easy to start with light exercise for 20-30 minutes, three to five times a week. You can also take help of a professional trainer. However, if you want to do it on you own here are some of the exercise tips for your first trimester:
- Yoga: Yoga is one of the best exercises you can do, yourself at home which is most beneficial for your first trimester. Yoga strengthens physical as well as mental health.
- All those aches and mood swings that you've been experiencing will vanish. Some of the yoga positions that you can do include Standing Mountain, Supported Squat, Belly Breathing, and Supported Triangle.
- And those to avoid are backbends, poses that twist the abdomen, headstands and complex yoga.
- Pilates: Pilates does wonder in maintaining the body balance and reduce lower back pain. You can start by sitting on a chair with your back straight. feet touching the floor, holding your arms at sides.
- If possible, you can carry a 5-8 pound weight in each hand and lift the weights, slowly followed by lowering the arms. You repeat it for 10-15 times for each arm.
- Pilates is suitable more for the first trimester than second and third trimester.
- Walking: Walking is one of the easiest exercises that builds upper body strength and tightens your legs too. You can start off your morning with 15 minutes walk every day with an evening walk of 30 minutes.
- Swimming: If you know swimming, then you've got an exercise hack for pregnancy, especially during the third trimester.
- Swimming moves every part of your body boosting the core strength. You can swim for 30 minutes, but avoid excessive twisting of your body too much.
- Don't exhaust yourself too much and it's not recommended during the first trimester or if you have any other complications.
- Dancing: If you are not an exercise person and hate going to the gym then, we have a life saver for you- Dancing! Dancing is fun as you can move your body freely with the sound of music and tone your muscles.
- Ballet is an excellent form of dancing which won't leave you breathless, however, it's always important to get suggestions from your doctor before doing any form of dancing.
- Cardio and weight training: Cardio helps you to lose weight but during pregnancy, it's advisable to perform not to lose weight but for relieving aches and boosting energy levels.
- You can also lift weights to carry pregnancy weight easily help for a healthy delivery. It's important to work with a trainer and follow a routine. You can do this twice-thrice a week for better results.
For more information also see, Learn here about the steps to follow and mistakes to avoid during your pregnancy.
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