Moms, Mats and Manuscripts
Moms, Mats and Manuscripts is a podcast hosted by Ivna, a PhD student in biomedicine, a yoga teacher and a mom, and Ksenia a former molecular biologist, a yoga teacher for scientists and a mom, too. This is a space to talk about all things academia, motherhood and yoga with humour and vulnerability.
We chat about mental health in academia, mindful productivity, and surviving and enjoying early motherhood while bringing yoga wisdom into our lives, share our stories and offer tips on navigating life's chaotic adventures.
Moms, Mats and Manuscripts
S3E8 - Prenatal yoga: our honest experiences, challenges and lessons
In this intimate, honest episode, we (two moms and yoga teachers) open up about how yoga supported us through pregnancy, labour, and postpartum - not just in the physical sense, but in how we learned to listen to ourselves, surrender, roar, and recover.
We reflect on:
🧘♀️ How our prenatal yoga routines shifted across trimesters
🔁 What we’d definitely do again and what we wish we had done differently
🌀 How yoga helped us stay intuitive, present, and calm during pregnancy
🗣️ The tools that actually made a difference in labour: breath, sound, focus, trust (and toe stands)
🦁 Tapping into our inner lioness: letting go of control and being unapologetic
💔 How postpartum cracked us open and how yoga tools helped us cope
💬 Why yoga off the mat (awareness, self-trust, and gentleness) matters more than the perfect pose or a full hour spent on your mat
This isn’t a how-to guide, it’s a conversation full of real stories, small wisdoms, and embodied experience. If you’re pregnant, postpartum, or simply curious about how yoga can meet you through the wild transitions of motherhood, this one’s for you.
Don't forget to like, follow, and share our podcast! We'd love to hear your thoughts and questions, and if you have ideas for future episodes, drop us a line.
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@moms.mats.manuscripts
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Ksenia's Instagram: shantiscience_yoga
Reach out: moms.mats.manuscripts@gmail.com
Hi, we're Ksenia and Ivna and this is Moms, Maths and Manuscripts,
SPEAKER_00:a podcast where honest conversations flow freely.
SPEAKER_01:We talk about yoga, motherhood, science and all the messy moments in between that shape us. So grab a cup of your favorite drink, settle in and join us for today's episode. Good morning and welcome to this next episode of Moms, Maths and Manuscripts. Today We're talking about yoga practice in pregnancy in general, our experiences, our knowledge, and also a little bit of comparison between first and second pregnancy.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that's right. I'm happy to hear how your experience was. I did yoga both in my first and now in second pregnancy. And it has been like a nice routine for me and for baby as well. that I kept doing also in postpartum. So I think we can talk about maybe the challenges on how to be regular, of benefits that we experienced, maybe on some cons that we had with practicing yoga. So let's just... As always, free-flowing conversation. Exactly. How was your first pregnancy? How was your yoga? We are both yoga teachers, so we did have a practice even before pregnancy. And tell me how it transformed once you saw the plus on your pregnancy test. I
SPEAKER_01:have to say that... The first trimester was like my practice was non-existent. Maybe, you know, I could think that I was practicing the more off the mat yoga or like, you know, self-compassion or mindfulness or whatever. None of that even because I felt like absolute disaster. I was really, I wasn't even sick, like vomiting or anything that much, but I was just feeling great. really, really, really unpleasant, uncomfortable, very tired. So just sleeping all the time. And I had moments in which I felt like, what if I'm, you know, doing something bad or like I have done something bad in a way for my body to behave this way, like my body's failing me or I am failing this pregnancy thing and I'm failing my baby. So I had all sorts of nasty thoughts that also were going with not feeling very well. And I tried. So while I was still feeling well-ish at the beginning, maybe the first six, seven weeks, I tried to still keep teaching, although it was Christmas time. So yeah, I didn't have really regular classes at that point.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Then after that, the morning sickness started.
SPEAKER_03:So
SPEAKER_01:I had a nice Christmas meal and a nice New Year's Eve celebration with my family. And then when we got back to Vienna, I was sick all the time. So at least I had that. At least I could eat all the wonderful Christmas
SPEAKER_00:food. Yeah, the last meal. Oh yeah, it would be a shame if it started earlier. Okay, okay, that's something good.
SPEAKER_01:But then yoga practice was kind of on pause and I had to also cancel a lot of classes that I was teaching without kind of saying to people that I'm okay, I'm pregnant. And my teaching and my practice were... on hold. And in the second trimester, things started to get better. I would say that I was quite active. I was teaching, I was practicing, but my yoga practice did get slower and more kind of mindful and I was really instead of going through some flow, I would maybe move in a very unstructured way and just try to listen to my body and feel where do I have some kind of tension, where do I have some kind of kinks or things that need to kind of be worked through. And if it was different between the sides, for example, I would not mind that. I would spend more time on like a tighter side. So not, you know, strictly three breaths here, three breaths there, but I was really trying to tune into what my body needed at that point. And we were also pretty, yeah, I think we were pretty active in late second trimester, early third trimester. We were traveling as well. We would go swimming and, you know, it did help my body also to feel a little better and I was I think I handled the second trimester and then third trimester quite quite okay because of that and also I do credit my my yoga practice and trying to also add on a little element of kind of hypnobirthing or birth prep and lace it with the yoga techniques and yoga breathing and some poses I do credit it for the easier experience, quote unquote, that I had in labor and during birth. So I am definitely aware of also some mistakes that I did. And I know what I'm going to do differently next time once I fall pregnant next time. But I think yoga has been important and really... pivotal in in how I handled pregnancy and or at least after the first trimester that was horrible in how I handled
SPEAKER_00:pregnancy and birth oh nice it's I could only say that I had very similar experience as you um But before, I'm very curious if you want to share those mistakes or things that you would do differently, and then I can jump in how my experience was. So I
SPEAKER_01:think what I would do differently is actually not very much related to yoga but it's more about strength and building strength beforehand before falling pregnant and also not shying away from strength training during pregnancy because i think i'm naturally falling on a more flexible side instead of more strong side and i obviously in pregnancy then you get even more flexible and i was focused on kind of stretching and opening through the pelvis and yada yada yada and i was still teaching yin yoga which is a big no-no as well yeah um i was trying not to take all these poses for as long as i was teaching them but i would still show and kind of maybe um unbalanced my my flexibility a little bit swung it to the far far end and my
SPEAKER_00:strength like oh look I'm even
SPEAKER_01:more flexible now I can just fold and yeah fold in two and perfect but yeah in the last two weeks of pregnancy I had some issues with I think It was never really formally diagnosed, but I think I had an issue with an SI joint, sacroiliac joint, and then sciatica. And so my right hip, right bum cheek, right side of my body was just on fire. And I was barely walking and I was trying to kind of do a little... little beats to stabilize it and
SPEAKER_02:help
SPEAKER_01:myself feel a little bit better and like feel like I can walk but obviously like whatever squats you can do in the last two weeks of pregnancy are not going to undo nine months of losing strength so I yeah I would definitely focus more on strengthening and try to be very careful with stretching and opening. Like it's important, obviously, but when you are already quite flexible and quite open, yeah, I would be more careful.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. As you said, as you're naturally flexible, then with pregnancy, even more, the body gets a lot of, this is relaxing hormone that really softens the joints and And for me, it was also difficult to avoid overstretching. I really needed to be fully conscious on everything I do on the mat and to actively think, okay, don't make your stance so wide. Make it shorter. Especially my arm would go in overstretch. And mostly it feels good. Those stretches feel so good. So you really need to be... aware that you shouldn't do that so much.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah,
SPEAKER_02:exactly.
SPEAKER_01:How was your experience? Apart from just similarities with the first trimester and not...
SPEAKER_00:Absolutely similar. So the first trimester was... Oh, man. I don't know even how to explain this. It's just you don't want to do anything. You just want to chill in the bed. I also didn't vomit, but I felt sick all the time. I felt just like, blah. I did have a little, like... I thought I needed to do any kind of yoga, so I was a bit feeling, oh, you have to do it, you have to do it, but I just couldn't. And then at some point I was like, okay, what the hell, I will just be with it. Allegedly they say the second trimester will be better. I doubt it. That was my thinking in the first trimester. But then magically somewhere around weeks 12, 13, I'm like, oh, look, this is my yoga mat here lying in the corner. And I suddenly got a nice motivation to do it again. I have to say that parallelly I started doing strength training at week nine of my pregnancy. So I felt still sick, but my husband was going to this gym. And in the gym, he saw like fully pregnant woman, month eight, nine, just doing some weird stuff, weird, badass stuff. And you just couldn't notice them. And he was like, Ina, you have to do this. They look so badass. They were, you know, doing like real exercises, deadlifts, squats, pushing the... I don't know how you call this exercise, but you put a weight on something and then you just like push it for like I'm preparing for a stroller ride uphill. And I decided to do it because I also knew that strength is my weaker side. And those trainings, even though I felt super, super shitty, super, super tired, made me feeling better after every session. And I think it was different from yoga because I went out there. I went fresh air. It was in the morning. In the morning, I felt mostly good. I talked to other people there. It's also a big community effect that made me feel better. Because I think I didn't have any community effect at home with my yoga mat. It was just like, I don't want to do it, right? So these stretching trainings really kept me going. But back to yoga, then in second trimester, I really got the motivation to start again. But I noticed that, as you said, those full flows felt too restrictive for my body at the time. And I so resonate with what you said with finding the flows that feel good, that are more open, more free flow, more... More like fluid, more made up in your head in this moment. And this, I would say, is crucial to do during pregnancy. I think some people have more difficulties to... Maybe we can do it as we are, you know, yoga teachers. Similarly, as my grandma can just make a meal out of nothing in the fridge because she has this experience and can be creative and can feel what goes in the pot. But I think if you have any sort of regular practice, you already know some moves that might inspire you to do even something crazy. Mostly this practice was super random, lasted anywhere from one minute to 30 minutes, depending on the day. Some days I would just open the yoga mat. lay on it, scroll Instagram and close it, right?
SPEAKER_01:And relate to that as well.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, but for me it was important just to keep the momentum going, to be constant, to do anything on the mat. And on some days I would just open it and I would be like, oh, I don't want to do this, but then I end up doing 15 minutes of open practice. Mm-hmm. And this was a really nice way to connect with your changing body. Mm-hmm. Because you do shoulder rolls one day, it feels completely different the other day, and you're like, oh, what changed? Then you look down, you see belly, you see how your whole body is changing from day to day. And I think yoga mat is a good place to really notice those changes and be with them. But really, if I see my practice, I couldn't tell you what I did. Just random stuff. Yeah. and I also fully agree that it helped me with combination with hypnobirthing and other things to feel empowered for birth but mostly to find autonomy in my body and to know what is happening here I think both you and me are more like people who understand their body but yoga practice builds this momentum even more to really know what is happening in.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah. To help you get really more intuitive and really more intuitive. Notice the sensations, notice the... Yeah, what you're feeling in the body and maybe... even understand like, is something okay? Is something maybe going a little bit wrong? Like, do I need to pay attention to that? Do I need to just chill and let everybody else know that they also have to chill? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:It kind of clears the mind. For sure. Then I also had some periods where I think the baby was maybe blocking some nerves and there were some sciatica pain as well. During these two weeks, I couldn't do much, also like barely walk. But then I did a lot of meditations. I count this maybe like a combination of hypnobirthing and yoga. And those were also quite helpful. So even if you... Even on the days when I felt really bad, I would turn on the meditation. And those were the long ones. I think my meditation practice was super consistent in the third trimester. I usually do, like, before pregnancy, 10-minute meditations. And now I did 30-minute. Just laying in bed with my headphones. And I feel like those were super helpful for... to learn this instant relaxation and it was a consistent practice of just okay now relax now relax now relax now relax which is good because in yoga you are parallelly learning at least in third trimester i did learning how to relax the pelvic floor and i think it's really connected with the mind with your jaw with the body and combining this mind relaxation with learning how to relax pelvic floor was also good for a birth preparation for me.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, for sure. Yeah. I think in my case, I was also doing a lot of that at the, at the very end and a lot of meditations, a lot of practicing the breathing, both kind of relaxing breathing where I would just kind of slowly, slowly, slowly exhale. And, um, also sounding so kind of not mantras but maybe just ah or so whatever you then start picking up in in labor kind of naturally if you are not feeling very self-conscious um you start at some point making sounds or well, you should start making sounds because it also helps. And I was thinking like, since I'm going to give birth in a hospital, I don't want to... In the moment, I don't want to feel like I have to be quiet or especially I don't want to be told that I have to be quiet. So I better practice in advance so that the sounds are just coming freely, coming as loudly as they need to. And I don't need to be like apologetic. I still... At some point in my labor, I still told to midwives, I hope you have good soundproofing here. I mean, I was, I think, a little bit unhinged. Like I did really make noises as I needed. And I feel like the preparation kind of helped to be free about it. And yeah. I
SPEAKER_00:love this.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. When the ambulance guys came to pick me up at some point, I did tell them to get out of the room and wait for me outside while I go through another contraction. And then they picked me up and brought me to the hospital. But yeah, it was also prep that I think happened in the third trimester. And one thing that I did and I loved for myself as well was... toe stance from yin yoga, it was always very uncomfortable for me. And I think it's uncomfortable for the majority of people because we are wearing shoes. We are not really, you know, walking barefoot as much as we're wearing. Not a lot of people that I know are wearing barefoot shoes, for example. So the feet are a little bit constricted and they're not very comfortable. very flexible and able to move in their full range of motion. So the toe stands were super uncomfortable and they did help me to learn how to breathe through the discomfort and redirect my focus from my toes and my feet to my breath. And I keep seeing this exercise for pregnancy, for birth prep with ice, where you're holding ice cubes in your palms and trying to go like, outside of this sensation in your palms and redirect your attention to your breathing. This somehow never did it for me, but the toes did. And I was fully able to, in labor, to focus on just this next breath, just this next breath. And I was at the beginning in kind of earlier phases, I was really counting the length of the inhales and exhales. And I know that this is not always possible. Sometimes the intensity just kind of smacks you in the face and you cannot do any of that. But for me, up until a certain point, this was also hugely helpful that I was counting the length of the inhale and exhale because it helped me focus and not be... Like, oh my God, what is happening? What is this sensation? What is this? Am I already too late? Do I need to go to the hospital? Not be in my head, but be really located. Just this feeling in my nose, just the length of my exhale out of the mouth. And that's it. Nothing else exists in the world in this moment. So I think those two things were also really, really helpful.
SPEAKER_00:Those are two really important ones.
UNKNOWN:I...
SPEAKER_00:I love the breath, the sound one. I think I will now, you inspired me to incorporate this as well. I also noticed that when I started doing yoga, I was super shy to do those stuff, those like horse breath, those even loud exhales. I would only do, you know, a shy exhale. And now you come to the class, you're just full, full in. It's my breath, I'm owning it. It's a wonderful, wonderful practice for hospital birth as well, as you mentioned. And super important to unleash your, you know, lioness or whatever sounds are coming out at this point. For me, this sound, I think I was mostly more or less quietish during birth, but... Towards the end, some sounds were there, loud ones, and those were such a great pain relief and such a really empowering experience. I remember those two screams. Those were like really freeing screams.
UNKNOWN:Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00:So I would like also encourage myself and others to really be loud. Yoga class as well. I always say farts welcome any kind of sound you need to make, you're free to make. It's always good to remind this. Because at least me, I thought that the yoga room needs to be quiet and, you know, calm place. But it should be welcoming for any size at any point as you need to do it.
SPEAKER_01:I mean, size and yawns and this kind of stuff is also a sign that your nervous system is relaxing. It's a sign of our sympathy.
SPEAKER_00:And those, you know, belly digestion, awakening.
SPEAKER_01:Digestion as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's
SPEAKER_00:a good one.
SPEAKER_01:yeah exactly so it's not nothing to be ashamed of and like especially if you're practicing at home or one-on-one like just let it all out
SPEAKER_00:yeah yeah okay and the toe stand yeah that's a good one it's also nice to see your thought pattern yeah dealing with some uncomfortable books or situation. What is your brain telling you? Is it telling you, I can't do this? And then you see that you really can do it. So for me, it was like a goddess pose squat. I always like to see how long can I stay there. And you get to know yourself better, I think. My brain was telling me weird stuff, like when I start running, I don't like running and my brain is, stop doing this, you can't do that. So the same thoughts came when the pose becomes challenging and difficult. But brain is one thing and body is another thing. And especially in birth, you really think it's difficult and you can't do it, but it's only your mind.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah,
SPEAKER_00:that was definitely my experience.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. It's it's a really I'm not normally a huge fan of affirmations. I somehow never could really fully connect to them. But I think also one thing that I noticed is that in pregnancy, I actually really tried to use this as a tool as well and kind of keep telling myself that Let's say pain in labor is not necessarily a sign that something is wrong. If you have a pain in your joint, if you have a broken arm and it hurts, obviously it's a sign that something is going wrong. Or you have a toothache, you have to go to the dentist. But pain in labor was a sign that your uterus is working, that things are working to bring your baby outside. So I was trying to be careful around the language. I was, you know, a few years ago, if somebody would tell me that I would avoid calling contractions, contractions, I would laugh because I was thinking like, this is such bullshit. Like who does that? Waves, surges. Oh my God, the flower child. What are you talking about? But I was in my pregnancy. I was trying to avoid the word contraction. And like in Russian, for example, the word for contraction is contract. also kind of like gripping or grabbing but also the other meaning of this word is like a fight or a battle and I didn't want to think so it's like a negative connotation kind of yeah I didn't want to think about these sensations in that way I was trying to be like okay sensations feelings whatever is happening like I'm just going to feel it I'm not going to be worried about it and like think oh it's pain and yeah this kind of rewiring your pattern your thinking pattern I think was also helpful and this was part of my meditation practice so I really try to catch my negative thoughts and like oh I'm so scared of the pain I'm so worried that it's going to be painful and try to be like it's not pain it's just sensations it's information for you and like if it's getting I do think Obviously, you know, there are caveats to everything that we're saying here. But I do think that in majority of cases, if things are going well and the pregnancy is uncomplicated and all that, if you have pain that is unbearable, maybe it's a signal that something like you need to change the position or you need to do something like maybe you know some specific locations of the pain also can be information for your body to to be like okay i need to do something i need to either ask for more support from you know birth partner to squeeze those hips or put hands on the sacrum or whatever or i need to change position so that the baby can move in through the pelvis move through the birth canal in in more efficient ways and or rotate you know sometimes it is really just information it's not a signal that something is going really badly and like your uterus is broken and
SPEAKER_00:obviously yeah pain in pregnancy in birth is maybe the only pain that is informative that is guide and we're like learned not to like the pain to avoid the pain but here I think this meditation practice to really be tuned in to listen what is pain telling you as a guide could be really helpful. What you said about moving, about letting the baby out, the body knows. And pain is maybe the best signal because we cannot be, you know, blind to pain and deaf to pain. Yeah, it's going to let you know. Yeah, the body figured out the best way to let you know that some change is needed. And the more you know your body, the more you listen to it, the better you know how to respond to this.
SPEAKER_01:Exactly. This is also where yoga practice is coming handy because you kind of build this intuition and this trust in your body to... know okay if if something hurts there how about if i move this way how about if i move that way and yeah yeah like my my experience was that i think my son i don't know because nobody really checked me in labor but um i i have a feeling that he was not in an optimal position i think he was turned So head down, but turned a little bit to the side. So not like back of his head and back of his body towards my belly, but a little bit askew. And I had a lot of pain in the back. And that is the only pain I actually remember. Like, I don't remember any other cramping or any other pain from labor at all. I just remember that I had uncomfortable sensations.
SPEAKER_00:It was like a different kind of pain.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And this is how I knew that, okay, labor has started, even though I tried to, throughout the entire labor, I tried to be in denial. And like, as long as possible, I'm just going to deny that I'm in labor. And then, you know... that will help me also to go through my day normally instead of being really focused on timing contractions right away or whatever. But yeah, so I was feeling a lot of back pain and then I felt really good. I felt so much better on all fours. I spent most of my labor on all fours because like this was something that I noticed was alleviating the back pain and also provided access for my husband to come in every few contractions and kind of rubbed the sacrum and squeezed my hips whenever I needed. But yeah, this positional changes were because of the signals from my body it's not something like somebody I had nobody here with me we were just the two of us in our own little bubble at home until we arrived to the hospital so nobody was telling me what position to take or you have to change positions I was just flowing with my own intuition and this this is I think the result of flowing with my own intuition in this unstructured open practices that we were doing
SPEAKER_00:yes It's like, what is this, the most random flow? How
SPEAKER_01:to
SPEAKER_00:be
SPEAKER_01:helpful, yeah. Exactly. Love
SPEAKER_00:it, love
SPEAKER_01:it. So do you notice any difference between the first time and the second time? How are you practicing or not practicing? What are you doing now?
SPEAKER_00:There is one big similarity, and this is first trimester and a little break from stepping on the mat. Mm-hmm. What I noticed, so the differences, yes. The first pregnancy was mostly, I think I really gave priority to my strength training because this was the habit I was building. It was not something that I was good at, really good at before. And it took a lot of energy to be consistent, to go to the training once or twice a week. So I really think that I didn't prioritize my yoga practice as much as I wanted. But at the time I was like, ah, no, yoga is like not important. Now I will just do five minutes on the mat. And this differs in my second pregnancy now. So now I, as I build the consistent strength training practice, I also continued postpartum without a break into the second pregnancy as well. And this It's not taking me as much energy. I already have my training days. I just do them, you know, as brushing my teeth without thinking. And now I have more capacity to play with my yoga practice, to spend more time there and to really prioritize it. In the meantime, I also did my prenatal teacher certificate, so... there are also some new insights and ideas that I can do on the mat, which are really helpful. And now I think it's like the rising era of my prenatal practice. What I'm keeping the same is this showing up. So Saturday is like my day for yoga. I have to do it, even though it's, you know, as I said, one minute of open yoga mat. But the more you do it, the last time it happens that it's only one minute so it really builds up and now I'm both working on this super consistent practice which is also a little bit challenging with a toddler around but we manage and I think I'm even deeper into understanding those intuitive movements and I will say that this and alleviating pain in hips, in shoulders, in neck, whatever happens with the, you know, pregnancy and weird sleeping positions and weird pelvic tilts that happen, you know, with the big belly. These are the two main goals that I want to achieve with yoga practice. What I think... didn't change is I rarely do a full hour of practice especially now with a toddler especially
SPEAKER_03:yeah luxury
SPEAKER_00:so you know I'm a yoga teacher but I just cannot do a full hour of practice maybe the the different time will come where this will be a priority but right now my practices became really short, but as well effective. I have like the bundle collection of 20 asanas and exercises that I know work for me that I think got profiled and chosen both in the first and now in the second pregnancy. And I just keep them doing, keep them rotating. It's like, oh, my hip really hurts. I was sleeping on the side for... five nights in a row on the same side. It felt good. But now my hip hurts. Then I have like five to six hip practices. I know they will be on the mat this Saturday, let's say. So this is how the prenatal practice looks like now in second trimester. And I think it's a good trimester. It's a lot of energy. The hormones are doing a good thing. Now finally everything is, you know, in place. It's good if you want to work on your consistency, if you want to maybe push the limits sometimes even to use this period where the belly is not too big and where you really feel good. Yeah. And I think my third trimester, I will implement more of those meditations and more of those. I really love those sound exercises. I will do more of these. And even more intuitive movements. Yeah. So this, like with closing your eyes and just by doing what your body feels to do, it's a wonderful practice. It's like, you know, like a free dance. You just do what your body asks you to do. I
SPEAKER_01:love it. Yeah. I think this is... Inspiring also for me for next time to know what's going to
SPEAKER_00:happen. I think I heard with the first versus second birth that you also notice more details. Some women even say that they can know the position where their baby is at any moment during birth. In my first birth, I was just like, not knowing much, just, you know, being there. And I feel that was similar as yoga. I, you know, I did, I felt a lot, but now the feels are a bit deeper. I know my body a little bit better than before. It's like, you know how with the, age or wine taste or coffee taste kind of refines and develops I think this is also something that is doing with my yoga practice
SPEAKER_02:yeah
SPEAKER_00:like the cat cow the most basics exercise now it's like oh look I can do this in cat pose now I can do this in cow pose like you really start seeing the little details that you haven't noticed before
SPEAKER_01:yeah absolutely and I think um Your trust in your body as well is refining. Especially, I guess, now that you have been through this experience once already and you have birthed your baby, brought him to the world, and now you know, okay, I can do it. You have proof, empirical and actual. And I feel like at least that's what I'm hoping for myself, that I will trust my body again. even more like i think i already did but there were moments definitely in labor where i felt like or in pregnancy where i felt a little bit like maybe i should you know talk to somebody or i was putting my trust in the doctors and like the system but um deep inside in in many of these cases i knew that everything was okay or i knew that I don't know, like, let's say I arrived to the hospital, I was feeling already very, very pushy. I was feeling like, okay, this is very close. But then when we were in the birthing room, at some point, I kind of, I was hoping that somebody will tell me, okay, now you can push.
SPEAKER_00:Is it really?
SPEAKER_01:I was still feeling pushy, but maybe, you know, not yet to that extent. But then my body kind of started the... fetal ejection reflex started vomiting the baby out almost it does feel like like you're vomiting out of your private parts and I didn't start pushing with the sensations or kind of helping a little bit to breathe my baby down with the sensations because I was still thinking you know what if I'm not fully dilated what if I'm what if I cannot push now so now I know like what so stupid
SPEAKER_00:oh yeah this is so silly I can relate. It's like, yes, I am trusting my body. I know that my body can do, but can it really do? Can it really? Yeah, it's always nice to have a proof, no matter, you know. Yeah. I think before the first pregnancy is trusting your body, but now it's like knowing that your body can work because you already went through all of this. It always helps, right? But the trust wouldn't be trust if, you know, you knew... yeah exactly
SPEAKER_01:yeah well I think we discussed everything we discussed yoga practice and beyond
SPEAKER_00:yeah and a bit more into birthing
SPEAKER_01:yeah
SPEAKER_00:one episode would also be nice like returning to your yoga mat after birth how was this as well
SPEAKER_01:yeah oh man that's a whole mess
SPEAKER_00:for me Postpartum mess episode.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I think that's going to be our next episode.
SPEAKER_00:It's still a process, right? It's still a process. Yeah, we should put it in our calendar. Definitely. Yeah, I think
SPEAKER_01:I need to clean up my act until then.
SPEAKER_00:It's a good motivation.
SPEAKER_01:So then we'll record that episode and I'm like, yeah, I have a yoga practice.
SPEAKER_00:oh yeah oh yeah that was a mess beautiful mess
SPEAKER_01:beautiful mess not so absolutely worth it but also really really hard i think when when you are kind of maybe a more structured person just by personality and more you know you like to have a plan and then um postpartum really hits you like a like a train and you're like oh okay I have to be very flexible and very resilient because plans are just a figment of my of my imagination they are not going to happen most likely so yeah
SPEAKER_00:yeah I think in postpartum plans are mostly like burden sometimes those are really helpful but postpartum is everything but plans
SPEAKER_01:yeah So this is, I guess, a different facet of a yoga practice in postpartum where it can help you build this maybe resilience and flexibility in your mind and self-compassion when things go really badly. But we'll go into these details
SPEAKER_00:later on. I already love it. But yes, I just have to say this, that both strength training practice and yoga practice were blossoming during pregnancy in regards to regularity. if we don't focus on the first trimester. But I think it was easier than, you know, before pregnancy to keep the momentum going. I don't know why, but this is something that just I noticed that the second trimester really gets you going. It's maybe because you're caring both for your body and for like your baby. And this was for me an even bigger motivator to show up and to do something on the mat.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I do think that this was really helpful. You were thinking, I'm not just doing it for myself. Yes, yes. We have to do it for ourselves as well. We have to care for ourselves. But when you are thinking, I'm doing it for both of us.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. That's also the episode. You don't self-care during pregnancy. How it often increases.
UNKNOWN:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:non-existent yeah i think okay i think we have we have good plans for the future
SPEAKER_00:yeah yeah today is a inspiration day
SPEAKER_01:inspiration day yeah that's good i think okay let's wrap up yeah we're teasing the future episode but we'll hear for now thank you for sharing thank you for inspiring me also for the future
SPEAKER_00:it was also really nice to hear your experience we always have something that we didn't know you know before so it was nice hearing the experiences
SPEAKER_01:we always have something that kind of mirrors like in my story and in your story it's always something that is very similar so yeah all right well thank you so much for being here today thank you so much for listening and we'll see each other here soon Have a good day!
