about a million years ago the question came to me about how yoga and mediation help with anxiety during pregnancy. so i'll try to answer, both from my experience as a pregnant woman and as a yoga instructor who should know these things.
to begin with i should say i am a chronically chilled out person. i just don't get super upset and anxious about things... then add to that an extremely healthy and natural view of pregnancy/birth from my mom and family and you'll see that i wasn't too anxious to begin with. so that's part of how i was able to navigate being pregnant and giving birth as if it was all no big deal. in some ways it wasn't... and in the way that i brought life to another human being.. it was a huge deal!
all that said, i did get anxious about my pregnancy at times, i was nervous to give birth and to become a mother and i know that yoga and meditation did help me through those times.
Yoga is pretty darn cool. Hatha yoga (the physical kind) is not just an exercise program as you probably know. it is a complex science of using your body movement and specific postures to work on your glands, organs, muscles, hormonal systems EVERYTHING. yoga also incorporates breath with the postures and helps to teach your body and mind how to handle stress automatically without your thinking mind having to get involved. yoga helps teach you to trust your body to do what it needs to do... very helpful in pregnancy.
so what yoga classes can do is put it all together. yoga classes can lead you through the poses that are best for releasing good hormones to create positive emotions in the mind and for your baby to swim in in the womb. yoga is exercise so it can release the exercise endorphins which help to put anxiety on the back burner. also, over time as you teach your body to respond to stress with deep breathing and clear concentration rather than getting overworked and anxious, the natural tendency towards anxiety lessens. how does that happen? you put your body under stress by asking it to hold the poses for what can feel like a long time. then as the body wants to move away from that stress you tell yourself to breathe through it. and you create a learned response that is pretty amazing.
for me my yoga practice was instrumental in feeling healthy and positive in the pregnancy i think. i'd practiced for years beforehand and felt strong and very capable in my body. i can do a headstand and handstands and felt very playful and that my body could pretty much do anything. that feeling grew very much out of my practice. then when i was pregnant it was a way to stay connected to my center core of who i am in the midst of swirling hormones, changing body shape, and wondering what kind of mother i will be. also while i was pregnant going to prenatal yoga class was a way to connect with other pregnant women and to feel 'normal' amongst them because nobody else i knew was pregnant. now, afterwards my yoga is again helping me to feel like ME as i am in the major identity flux of being a mother for the first time. at least i have my yoga. my body feels good after i practice, it feels like home, and i can rest.
the other piece to the yoga practice for me is that it created a spiritual framework for understanding what was happening in my body. the yoga i practice is a from a tantric philosophy which says Life is Good. so pregnancy is the ultimate expression of Life is Good because here i am CREATING a life. Life is REALLY good. the spiritual part carried over into the birth for me as well and is something very dear to my heart.
branching from the spiritual into meditation is a good transition. meditation can be like prayer... or nothing like it. i think meditation helps with anxiety because it is designed to bring the meditator into the present moment. anxiety is NEVER in the present moment. mostly it is in the future... what if this? what if that?.... sometimes re-thinking the past can create anxiety as well. but feeling anxious about what you are currently doing is rare i think. so meditation helps to train the mind to just BE HERE NOW. let go of the past, let go of later and be in this moment completely. perfect for birth actually, and really great for motherhood too. so in the beginning of the pregnancy i was still practicing a buddhist meditation of just sitting and observing my breath for 15 minutes. and it was amazing how much different i would feel afterwards.
then there is mantra meditation. that is when you repeat a mantra in your mind or out loud during the meditation session. the real mantras in sanskrit have practically magical powers and some of them you are supposed to be careful with. for pregnancy, though, i found mantra meditation REALLY helpful. and i didn't use the sanskrit ones, i just created my own that spoke to what i needed at the time. so if i was worried and working myself up about pain in childbirth and i sat down and told myself over and over for 15 minutes that i could do it. then by the time i was done telling myself that, i really believed it.. AND when the birth came my mantra popped back into my head and again, i believed myself. it is the power of the spoken word. (if you want specific instructions for this ask and i'll post some or i'll post a link)
the thing about both though is that while they work in the one time shot, that is, you will feel better if you do it only once, they work even better and the effects last longer if you are consistent. a yoga practice in class or at home even with a video can have profound effects on your mood, body, relationships, LIFE... and meditation can do the same. and both are well known and prescribed for people suffering from anxiety. pregnancy definitely is an anxiety creating situation... even THINKING about pregnancy creates a lot of anxiety. so it is a perfect time to start yoga and meditation... and then maybe you'll be hooked for life.
that's my speech. i love them. i have a very positive outlook on life and i know it is in part because of yoga and meditation.
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