Pregnancy is an exciting time. It’s full of lots of changes in your life, family, and your body. There’s lots of information out there for mamas-to-be that can help you keep your growing baby safe and healthy during your pregnancy, but it’s important to keep yourself healthy, too.
And it’s not just about physical health!
Mental and emotional health is key, as well. With all the changes you’re bound to experience during pregnancy, it can be hard to find an exercise program that offers what you need. But guess what? — Doing prenatal yoga at home might be exactly what you’re looking for!
Any time you start a new exercise program, it’s important to take the time to educate yourself about what you’re getting into and what you can gain from it.
This is especially true when you’re pregnant.
If you’re thinking about doing prenatal yoga at home, you should start by understanding why it’s a good idea! There are lots of health benefits of doing prenatal yoga at home. The more you know about those benefits, the easier it will be for you to decide if it’s a good exercise program for you and to stay motivated to stick with it throughout your pregnancy.
Check out these major benefits to doing prenatal yoga at home:
- It’s good for your mental health.
- It can boost your flexibility throughout pregnancy.
- It will help you build strength.
- It can adapt along with your body.
- It’s convenient!
- It’s a low-impact exercise option.
- It’s cost-effective.
- It will give you an all-natural pregnancy glow.
- It may help you get better sleep!
- It promotes self-love.
- You can get your partner involved.
#1) It’s good for your mental health.
Let’s just cut to the chase: Pregnancy is stressful even under the best circumstances.
As an expectant mom, your body is going through constant major physical, mental, and emotional changes. Add that to normal daily pressures of work and family responsibilities and there’s no question that pregnant women are stressed.
Fortunately, doing prenatal yoga at home is a great way to relax. Per UC Santa Cruz, yoga has a range of mental health benefits, including increased emotional stability, reduced depression, increased ability to be present in the moment, and more. The practice’s slow movements and emphasis on breathing will help lower your heart rate and encourage you to let go of what’s weighing you down. And it will boost your happiness!
There’s a bonus to practicing prenatal yoga at home, too! If you do yoga at home, you have the added relaxation of being in your own home. You’ll be comfortable in your own space. Doing prenatal yoga at home will help ease your stress so you can enjoy being pregnant as much as possible. Prenatal yoga is about more than just physical health benefits. There’s a lot to gain for your mental health!
#2) It can boost your flexibility throughout pregnancy.
Yoga is well-known for increasing flexibility — and you’ll need that throughout your pregnancy. Over the course of the nine months, your growing belly will force you to change the way you move. Doing prenatal yoga at home regularly throughout your pregnancy will help keep you flexible so you can stay as active as possible from beginning to end. This might even help you recover more easily after you give birth.
Flexibility is important beyond your pregnancy and delivery. As you get older, flexibility will become even more critical to help you maintain your mobility. Why not start now?
#3) It will help you build strength.
Yoga builds more than flexibility for expectant moms. It builds strength, as well.
Strength training is always an important part of your workout, even while you’re pregnant. (And no one’s saying you need to build beefy muscles.) As your baby grows, you will need more strength to carry the weight and keep up with everything else you need to do on a daily basis. Your body will adapt naturally, of course, but regular exercise can help it adapt more easily and better prepare you to recover when the baby arrives.
The cool thing about yoga is that it uses your body weight to improve strength. As your body changes, prenatal yoga at home will help you to continue strengthening your body to stay healthy for yourself and for your baby.
#4) It can adapt along with your body.
We’re not pretending that it’s easy to keep up with a regular exercise routine during pregnancy. After all, it’s easy to make excuses to skip out on a fitness sesh even when you’re not bumpin’!
Even women who generally have no problem getting motivated to work out might feel frustrated when navigating the world of prenatal exercise. As your body changes, you might find yourself dealing with physical limitations you weren’t expecting. It may even make you consider stopping your workout routines!
But that doesn’t have to happen with prenatal yoga at home, because yoga is highly adaptable. Poses can easily be adjusted to accommodate different skill and mobility levels at every stage of pregnancy. Even when you begin to feel like your belly is interfering with everything, it doesn’t have to keep you from doing yoga on a regular basis.
#5) It’s convenient!
Bottom line: doing prenatal yoga at home is one of the most convenient forms of exercise for mamas-to-be. Your energy is in short supply (you are growing a human being!), and when you do prenatal yoga at home, you can save some of that much-needed energy.
You don’t even need any special equipment or gear to do it! You don’t actually even need a yoga mat. Between your work schedule, family obligations, and the extra doctor’s appointments that are often required throughout your pregnancy, you don’ need any more reason to stress about scheduling. Knowing you can keep exercising regularly with prenatal yoga at home is sure to be a big relief.
With online yoga classes, you can exercise whenever it’s convenient for you, whether that’s before work, after work, during lunch, or even at one in the morning when you’re having trouble sleeping. You don’t have to commit to a set time every week. Your exercise schedule can work the way you need it to. And that’s how it should be!
#6) It’s a low-impact exercise option.
Yoga focuses on slow movements and held poses, which means it’s one of the lowest-impact exercise programs out there. Other exercise programs (like running or biking) can be hard on certain joints and muscles. People who rely on higher-impact exercises may even have to stop those activities because they’ve already put so much stress on their bodies! And no one wants to be a quitter.
High-impact exercises are especially off-limits when you’re pregnant.
Yoga, on the other hand, is low-impact, which means you can do it without aggravating pregnancy aches and pains. It also means that you can work up to daily yoga without worrying too much about overworking your body and causing an injury. If you’re worried about the impact of your regular exercise routine on your body during pregnancy, doing prenatal yoga at home is bound to be a good option for you.
#7) It’s cost-effective.
If you’re expanding your family, you probably have budgets on the brain. That’s totally normal!
Doing prenatal yoga at home is a good way to stay physically fit without adding extra bills to your budget. You don’t need special equipment for yoga at home. In fact, all you really need is yourself and maybe a yoga mat to keep your feet from slipping. When you do yoga at home, you can focus simply on staying healthy. Put that extra money into gear for your baby instead of a gym membership or expensive workout equipment.
Online yoga classes are a cost-effective option that doesn’t skimp on quality.
#8) It will give you an all-natural pregnancy glow.
You’ve probably heard about that “pregnancy glow.” But that doesn’t mean you’re actually experiencing it yourself. In fact, when you’re in the thick of dealing with pregnancy symptoms, you might feel like you’re the furthest thing from glowing.
Take control of your glow by adding prenatal yoga at home to your routine!
#9) It may help you get better sleep!
As exhausting as pregnancy can be, it’s not necessarily conducive to getting comfortable and easing into a restful night’s sleep. If you’re spending a lot of time tossing and turning, you may not be getting the rest you need to keep up with the demands currently being put on your body. (Again — you’re growing a human being).
Enter prenatal yoga at home!
According to Harvard Health, yoga has been linked to better and more consistent sleep! The experts there cite a national survey in which more than 55% of people who did yoga found that it helped them get better sleep. So hit the mat and prepare to hit the hay, mamas!
#10) It promotes self-love.
Self-love is important under all circumstances. We think it’s especially important for you to prioritize it when you’re pregnant. With all the time you’re spending thinking about what you should be doing to care for your body and your baby, it’s all too easy to forget that YOU deserve attention, too!
Exercise — including prenatal yoga at home — is a great way to practice self-love. The many physical health benefits of online yoga will make you feel better in your body.
#11) You can get your partner involved.
You may be the only pregnant one in the relationship. Still, the changes and stresses that you’re experiencing are bound to impact the dynamic between you and your S.O. With everything you’re doing to prepare for the baby’s arrival, it’s probably been a while since you set time aside for quality time!
Because prenatal yoga at home is designed for pregnant people specifically, it may not be perfectly suited for those who aren’t pregnant. Your partner still might enjoy joining you for an online class, moving in and out of beginner poses and getting in touch with their breath. They might choose to explore other kinds of classes, too, so you can bond over your new, shared interest in yoga.
Let’s recap…
Staying healthy during your pregnancy is important for you and for your baby. While you’re pregnant, you need to find an exercise routine that works for your needs and can adapt as your body changes through your pregnancy. Yoga is a low-impact, adaptable exercise program that will give you everything you need to stay healthy during your pregnancy and beyond. Take a look at our prenatal yoga guide for more information.
Check out our awesome prenatal and postpartum classes…
- Prenatal & Postpartum 1 with Tessa — The Basics
- Prenatal & Postpartum 2 with Tessa — Flow
- Prenatal & Postpartum 3 with Tessa — Strength
When you’re ready to start taking advantage of the health benefits of doing prenatal yoga at home, Bulldog Online is the answer. Our online yoga can help you develop a regular practice that will keep you feelin’ good until your baby is born — and after, too!