Yin Yoga during pregnancy

[admin]

This is a question from José de Groot. She asked, "I would like to put a question on the forum...maybe you can help me out. I was wondering if pregnant women can practice Yin yoga. Pregnant women produce a hormone from which they become more flexible, is it therefor advisable to practice Yin Yoga?"

Here is my initial reply, but thoughts from others would be great too!

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The quick answer is "yes". Even though women do have the hormone relaxin released during pregnancy, to loosen up the pubic symphysis and allow the pelvis to widen during delivery, there are many benefits to the practice energetically for you. The key though is to not try to go to any new limits of flexibility. Stay where you have gotten to before you were pregnant and just hang out there. Don't try to go right to your deepest edge...that could be too far. But the compression and stretching of the tissues still generate energetic benefits for you and the baby.

[brendya]

What other than pregnancy can cause you to miss your period if you are on the pill? I've heard health conditions might, but what kind? Thanks.

[Bernie]

This question is not too Yin Yoga related, and I am neither a doctor nor a woman, so my expertise here is close to zip, nada, ziltch. So, despite treading on dangerous grounds, I will offer you my limited understanding of why women could miss periods.

The pill shouldn't really affect your period. When my (ex)wife was on the pill, her periods were quite regular. Some pills may have too little estrogen, which can cause missed periods, and some pills are progestin only, which can also caused skipped periods. But I would think missing your period is not a good sign and you may want to check with your health care professional and make sure you are on the "right" pill. (Again, what do I know, but it can't hurt to ask your doctor.)

Non-pill related causes do exist as well. Amenorrhea (where you have missed 3 periods in a row) can be related to stress (yoga can help!) or to too little body fat, often caused by over-exercising (yin yoga can help, if you substitute it for extreme workouts) or more serious problems/diseases. Ultra-marathoners often have no periods because they train so much that their body fat goes down too much. Your body needs fat. Estrogen is produced from fat, or more precisely from cholesterol. (Almost all our hormones are made from cholesterol, so avoiding fat religiously can cause lots of problems.)

Too much Yang Yoga can stop your period. Balance your life with yin and yang.
Hope this helps!
Bernie

[gillasey]

What are the pregnancy symptoms just before your period is going to start?
if i am pregnant i would of conceived 4 days ago, i have sore boobs, and tiny little twingy cramps in my stomach, nothing painful though, ive also been very emotional could this just be my period coming or pregnancy symptoms? im due either the 30th or 31st for my period, did anyone have these symptoms or anyother ones so early on in your pregnancy, all your help would be so greatful thankyou.

[Kaycee]

Hello Gillasey,

Bernie's asked me to chime in on this one since I'm a bit more in touch with the female side of things than he is (I am a girl, after all) and I've had some personal experiences with the questions you're facing right now.

I hope I can offer some useful information, but I have to say right off the bat: absolutely no one is going to be able to answer the question you're really dealing with right now, which is whether or not you're pregnant. All you can really do is wait. The early symptoms of pregnancy are frustratingly similar to common pms - sore breasts, fatigue, headaches, cramps, and even a bit of bleeding (though that's quite rare). At the point you're at, 4 days post possible conception, it's unlikely that you'd be feeling too many things, since the fertilized egg would still be traveling through your tube and not triggering too many hormones yet. Again, you really just have to wait. I've been there, and I know that it's hard, regardless of the answer you're hoping to get.

As for pregnancy tests, there are some that claim to be able to tell you 5 days before you've missed your period, but I've heard of a lot of false negatives with those, so you would do best to wait until you've actually missed your period by at least a day.

In the meantime, the thing to do is to take good care of yourself, and try to stay happy. Get lots of sleep, eat well, drink lots of water, and avoid alcohol, cigarettes, sushi, sandwich meat, and anything that might have gone bad. Bernie could jump in here with some good advice on what sort of yoga to do to stay as healthy and relaxed as possible. I think I've heard that you should avoid strenuous twisting, but he'd know much better than me on that.

I hope this helps. Take good care.