Active Pregnancy

In my first pregnancy, I lived in a temperate climate and was very active: biking to work every day, walking the dog, jogging some times, downhill skiing, and a bit of x-c skiing.  The biking to work every day was awesome; it helped to wake me up in the morning and re-energize (most days!) on the way home.  I definitely got slower (!) and had to make modifications to my bikes to accommodate my growing belly, but loved it.  It also felt very empowering to be in such good shape and strong going into the unknowns of labour and delivery.

This pregnancy, I haven't had a job to commute to every day, so other than walking the dog (and toddler!) with some x-c skiing on the weekends and now gardening, I feel like I've been much less active.  This was amplified by the fact that we had a pretty chilly winter in Calgary this year, which made it challenging to get out for any length of time some days - although we did manage to get out most days, phew.  I definitely don't feel in as good a shape as I was for the first pregnancy, strength or cardio-wise.  Some times I think maybe that's good, perhaps my muscles and body are just more relaxed.  This is me trying to think positively, at least!

One thing that has been really important for me this pregnancy - at least one thing that is relevant to this blog - is being a different sort of active, I'll call it mindfully active.  What I mean by this is that I am trying to help my physical body get to a point of relaxation and, as a result (hopefully!), flexibility and looseness to ease labour and delivery.  The main modality that I have been working with so far has been chiropractic, in addition to some simple stretching.  I am now about two months away from my expected due date (EDD) and am looking to ramp up my stretching by include some more yoga and other exercises.  I can berate myself and say that I should have been working on these things prior to conception, but I won't go there.

These are the resources that I am looking at using:

1. Stretch, Open, Breathe {12 Prenatal Yoga Poses To Prepare For Birth} from Birth Without Fear blog.
2. Daily Activities for Pregnancy from Spinning Babies website

And, these are some inspiring folk out there who have been or are currently active in their preganc(ies):

1. Pregnant page from Girls and Bicycles blog
2. Pregnant page/tags from Pedal Adventures (formerly Velo Mom) blog
3. Pregnancy archives from The Adventures in Parenthood Project blog

Happy fetus growing to those in the same boat!  Any resources to share?  Please comment below.