Swimming whilst pregnant is an effective, safe form of exercise.

A few tips can help you stay safe when exercising.

Always:

• begin by warming up for 5 minutes and stretching for 5 minutes
• finish with 5 to 10 minutes of gradually slower exercise that ends with gentle stretching.

Here are some useful tips:

• Wear loose-fitting, comfortable clothes, and a good support bra.
• Choose supportive shoes designed specifically for the exercise you have chosen, to help prevent injury.
• Exercise on a flat, level surface to avoid injury.
• Eat small, frequent meals throughout the day, and don’t exercise for at least 1 hour after eating.
• Drink plenty of water before, during and after exercise, to keep hydrated.
• Get up slowly and gradually to prevent dizziness.

Remember that:

• The body needs more oxygen and energy during pregnancy.
• The hormone relaxin, produced during pregnancy, causes the ligaments that support the joints to stretch, increasing the risk of injury.
• The mother’s changing weight alters the center of gravity, putting extra strain on the joints and muscles in the lower back and the pelvis and increasing the chance of losing balance.

Before you begin exercising, remember it is important to talk to your health care provider. If you typically get little or no activity, walking is a great exercise to start with. Walking is usually safe for everyone, it is easy on your body and joints, and it doesn’t require extra equipment. It is also easy to fit into a busy schedule.

Squatting during labor may help open your pelvic outlet to help your baby descend, so practice squatting during pregnancy. To do a squat, stand with feet shoulder width apart and slowly lower into a squat position. You should keep your back straight, heels on the floor and your knees shouldn’t protrude in front of your feet. Hold the squat for 10 to 30 seconds; you can rest your hands on your knees.

Then slowly stand back up, pushing up from your knees with your arms, if you need to. Repeat this 5 times working up to more.

Pelvic tilts strengthen the muscles in your abdomen and help alleviate back pain during pregnancy and labor. To do pelvic tilts get on your hands and knees. Tilt your hips forward and pull your abdomen in. Your back should slightly round. Stay in this position for a few seconds then relax without letting your back sag. Repeat a couple of times, working up to 10.

Exercising for 30 minutes on most, or all, days can benefit your health during pregnancy. Exercising for just 20 minutes, 3 or 4 days a week, is still beneficial, as well. The important thing is to be active and get your blood flowing.

To have success in completing exercises during pregnancy, it is a good idea to plan the days and times during the week when you will exercise. As shown in the photo above, prenatal yoga  is a great, low impact exercise that can be highly beneficial for pregnant women.

Here are some of the benefits from exercise during pregnancy you may experience:

• Helps reduce backaches, constipation, bloating, and swelling
• May help prevent, or treat, gestational diabetes
• Increases your energy
• Improves your mood
• Improves your posture
• Promotes muscle tone, strength, and endurance
• Helps you sleep better
• Regular activity also helps keep you fit during pregnancy and may improve your ability to cope with labor. This will make it easier for you to get back in shape after your baby is born.

If you’re new at exercising, now’s not the time to start training for a marathon — but you can start working out slowly, aiming to reach at least 30 minutes a day.

If you’re really ambitious (or just really fit) and you’ve been green-lighted by your practitioner based on your fitness level, it’s safe to work out for an hour or even more as long as you listen to your body. Expecting moms tire out sooner, and being tired increases your risk of injury. Remember that while pregnancy is a great time to maintain your fitness level, it’s not a time to increase it or to train for an athletic competition. 

While breathing hard during your workouts is perfectly fine when you’re expecting, overexerting yourself can lead to problems like dehydration (a risk factor for preterm birth) or lack of oxygen to your baby if you end up short of breath for long periods. That’s why it’s more important than ever to learn to listen to your body during pregnancy.

So how exactly do you do that? Checking your pulse is actually not one of the ways to tell whether you’re overdoing it. Instead, get in sync with how you feel. If an exercise feels good, it’s probably okay, while experiencing pain or strain is not. A little sweat is good, while drenching sweat is not. And remember the “talk” test: You should be working hard enough that you feel yourself breathing more heavily, but you should never be so out of breath that you aren’t able to talk, sing or whistle while you work.

Experts at ACOG recommend using what’s known as a “Rate of Perceived Exertion” test. Think of a scale that goes up to 20, where at 7 you’re walking slowly and at 20 you’re working out as hard as you can. Your goal is to keep your exertion rate between 13 and 14 on that scale, or at a somewhat hard rate. 

• Sports that carry a higher risk of falling or abdominal injury, like gymnastics, downhill skiing, snowboarding, ice-skating, vigorous racket sports (play doubles instead of singles), horseback riding, outdoor cycling, contact sports (such as ice hockey, soccer or basketball), diving, bungee jumping and rollerblading.
• Sports that involve altitude change. Unless you’re living in high altitudes already, avoid any activity that takes you up more than 6,000 feet. On the flip side, scuba diving, which poses a risk of decompression sickness for your baby, is also off-limits, so wait until you’re no longer pregnant for your next dive.
• Exercises that involve lying flat on your back for long periods of time are off-limits after the fourth month, since the weight of your enlarging uterus could compress major blood vessels and restrict circulation to you and your baby. That, in turn, could make you feel nauseous, dizzy and short of breath.
• Advanced abdominal moves, like full sit-ups or double leg lifts, can pull on the abdomen, so they’re best avoided when you’re expecting. Try these pregnancy safe an exercise instead.
• Hot yoga or exercise in super hot weather: Any exercise or environment that raises your body temperature more than 1.5 degrees F should be avoided, since it causes blood to be shunted away from your uterus and to your skin as your body attempts to cool off. That means staying out of saunas, steam rooms and hot tubs, too.
• Back bends or other contortions, as well as movements that involve deep flexion or extension of joints (like deep knee bends), can increase your risk of injury.
• Jumping, bouncing and sudden, jerky motions are best avoided (although otherwise aerobic activity is perfectly safe so as long as you’re comfortable and can easily keep your balance).
• Excessive or bouncy stretching. Since your ligaments are already looser, pregnancy isn’t the time to force a split or progress your yoga practice. If something hurts, stop.
• Holding your breath is never recommended during pregnancy. Both you and your baby need a constant flow of oxygen.
• Motionless standing after the first trimester can restrict blood flow, so avoid these types of movements in yoga (like tree, or extended hand to big toe) and tai chi.

For healthy pregnant women, regular exercise can:

• Keep your mind and body healthy. Physical activity can help you feel good and give you extra energy. It also makes your heart, lungs and blood vessels strong and helps you stay fit.
• Help you gain the right amount of weight during pregnancy
• Ease some common discomforts of pregnancy, like constipation, back pain and swelling in your legs, ankles and feet
• Help you manage stress and sleep better. Stress is worry, strain or pressure that you feel in response to things that happen in your life.
• Help reduce your risk of pregnancy complications, like gestational diabetes and preeclampsia. Gestational diabetes is a kind of diabetes that can happen during pregnancy. It’s a condition in which your body has too much sugar (called glucose) in the blood. Preeclampsia is a kind of high blood pressure some women get after the 20th week of pregnancy or after giving birth. These conditions can increase your risk of having complications during pregnancy, like premature birth (birth before 37 weeks of pregnancy).
• Help reduce your risk of having a cesarean birth (also called c-section). Cesarean birth is surgery in which your baby is born through a cut that your doctor makes in your belly and uterus.
• Gets your body ready for labor and birth. Activities like prenatal yoga and Pilates can help you practice breathing, meditation and other calming methods that may help you manage labor pain. Regular exercise can help give you energy and strength to get through labor.

1.Warm up

All exercise should begin with a warm up and cool down period. The hormones produced during pregnancy make women especially flexible in preparation for childbirth but this can lead to excessive stretching and pulling which can cause injury. Stretching should be done very gently, especially after the first trimester.

2.Walking

Walking is the most common exercise amongst pregnant women. Walking is safe for everyone, including pregnant women who are only just beginning to exercise. Walking has a low risk of falls and it is easy to control exertion levels. Brisk walking is low impact for joints and muscles yet still gives a total body workout and improves cardiovascular fitness.

3.Water sports

Some water sports such as swimming, water aerobics and water walking are safe and fun sports.

Swimming works almost all muscles in the body without the risk of overheating. Water aerobics is great for cardiovascular fitness. These water sports are safe as there is no risk of falling or losing balance and the water supports body weight so the risk of muscle strain is low.

Water activities are especially effective for women who experience back pain and leg swelling during pregnancy as it has been found to alleviate these symptoms.

4.Stationary cycling

Cycling is another good cardiovascular workout that will help improve leg muscle strength. During pregnancy stationary cycling is a better alternative because as your belly grows, especially in the third trimester, balance on a bike will be difficult.

5.Weight training

Studies to date on light to moderate resistance trainingusing free weights and weight machines during pregnancy have found no adverse findings in patients that regularly engaged in the activity before pregnancy. Women who have never engaged in weight training prior to their pregnancy should not begin once they have conceived.

Studies have shown that there are benefits from engaging in weight training while pregnant. Improvements in strength and flexibility have been noted. This is turn will help the body adapt to the physiological changes that occur during pregnancy. Women may find they can tolerate their heavier body weight and altered centre of gravity better with muscle strengthening that is gained from training, especially focussing on lower back strength.

5.Running

Running is safe in moderation for women that were running frequently before they became pregnant. It is not advised that women that have never run before take up running during their pregnancy. Depending on the individual, the running regime may need to lessen in intensity and frequency.