After giving birth

Causes and symptoms

During pregnancy, the connective tissue that normally holds our abdominal muscles together becomes thinner and more elastic. This is to make room for the growing belly.

After birth, you may experience, for example, if you get up from a lying position, that you have an elongated bulge down towards your belly button. This is called a rectus diastasis (a gap between the straight abdominal muscles) and is completely normal. The connective tissue between the abdominal muscles will spontaneously contract over time and the bulge will become smaller. It is individual how long it takes before this happens.

If you have a diastasis, you should not be nervous about using your body when, for example, lifting, walking or running. But you should of course take into account and listen to your body.

What you can do yourself

After pregnancy and childbirth, the pelvic floor muscles may be weak. This means that you may have difficulty holding in water when, for example, sneezing and coughing.

It is therefore important to focus on the pelvic floor muscles. The pelvic floor has the task of closing the openings in the urethra, rectum and vagina and supporting the organs in the lower abdomen.

Exercise

It is important that you start exercising after giving birth, but take into account your physical ability. Below you will find a number of exercises to strengthen your stomach, back and pelvic floor. You can do the exercises every day.

Abdominal Stability Exercise

Repetitions: 3x10 repetitions

How to do it: Lie on your back with your legs bent and your feet on the floor. Suck your belly button down towards your spine without moving your back or pelvis. Feel the tension build up around your belly button and groin. Be careful not to hold your breath while doing this exercise.

Heel dip

Reps: 3x10 reps

How to do it: Lie on your back with both hips and knees bent at 90 degrees and arms at your sides. Engage your abs (suck your belly button slightly towards your spine) and keep your lower back flat on the floor. Slowly lower one foot towards the floor as you exhale. Repeat with the other foot.

Pelvic lift

Reps: 3x10 reps

How to do it: Lie on your back, place the soles of your feet on the floor and keep your legs bent and your arms out to the side. Lift your pelvis off the floor until you are only resting on your shoulder blades. Be careful not to arch your back. Lower and lift slowly.

Pelvic floor exercise

Repetitions: 1x 5 repetitions

How to do it: You train your pelvic floor by doing squeeze exercises. A good squeeze starts at the anus. Imagine that you have to hold back a fart so that you feel an activity here. At first, it is completely normal that it is difficult to hold a squeeze. You may not feel the squeeze clearly at the vagina and urethra. Your squeeze with a focus on the anus will train all the openings in the pelvic floor. Focus on not tensing your gluteal muscles when doing the squeeze, and make sure that you breathe normally.

Pelvic floor exercise

Reps: 1x 5 reps

How to do it: Lie on your back with your legs bent or straight and relax your stomach, buttocks and thighs. Squeeze and hold the tension for 5-10 seconds. Pause for 5-10 seconds before squeezing again. It is more important that you hold the squeeze for a longer time and then do fewer reps than that you focus on doing more reps with short squeezes.

You can see a description of how to squeeze in Pelvic Floor Exercise 1.

Pelvic floor exercise

Repetitions: 1x 5 repetitions

How to do it: You get up and sit down many times a day. Practice squeezing when you get up and sit down with your baby in your arms. Squeeze before you get up and hold it until you are standing. Squeeze before you sit down and hold it until you sit down. It is more important that you hold the squeeze for a longer time and then do fewer repetitions than that you focus on doing more repetitions with short squeezes.

You can see a description of how to squeeze in Pelvic Floor Exercise 1.