Simple exercises I Pre-Pregnancy with Coach Urmi

0:12 Let's get on with the kind of workouts and exercises that you need to do when you're trying to conceive and make sure you start your plan at least 3 months prior to get maximum benefits. The first one is just understanding how to relax your body and do lots of restorative work which is either stretching or foam rolling or yoga or any kind of leisurely walks. So I usually like to de-stress with some stretches first. So, I'm just gonna do a cat stretch.

0:44 Bringing the palms underneath the shoulders the knees are between your hips. You arch your back as you inhale and as you exhale you push the spine up to the ceiling, tuck your tailbone in. Feel the collar bone nicely open. And exhale, tuck it inwards. From there another stretch that I really like to do for feeling relaxed is the downward dog. So make sure you're trying to push your heels down. It's okay if you don't touch but you need to try to push them as down as possible and shoulders rolling out and your head is relaxed between the arms. Make sure you're not sinking your chest downwards.

1:30 Stay here for another 15 breaths and then release. Right. One of my favourite stretch is the pigeon. That will really release any tension in the hips. So you bring your shin perpendicular to the torso and you can just stay down and relax just relax. You can do this at end of the day or the beginning. And make sure your hips are squared so you're not sinking to one side but make sure you're pushing your opposite hip to the heel and again spend a good 30 seconds to 1 minute over here.

2:08 And another one you can do is foam rolling which is good to release any tension in the upper back. So I'm just going to show you that first. You're going to lie on the back and you're going to have your foam roller at the end of your shoulder blades. You're going to stay relaxed. You can support your hands at the back so that your neck doesn't feel strained. Look at the front at a 45 degree angle, lift your butt up and you can start rolling back and forth like the way I am. So this is a really good foam rolling movement and the last one that I'm going to show you is the ITB band. Again whether you're pregnant or trying to get pregnant, generally, when you walk a lot or even when we're training, we end up tightening our ITB quite a bit so you're going to lie down sideways and just roll from the knee till the hip and make sure you're not crossing the joint.

3:08 You are working your fascia which is the soft tissue that binds the muscle. That is what you're trying to release right now which is called the iliotibial band and this can avoid any knee pain in the future as well and reduce any visits to the physiotherapist. Make sure you're breathing well for about 30 seconds to 1 minute.