Pregnancy Yoga

Pregnancy yoga is an invaluable tool which will guide you smoothly through pregnancy and childbirth. The benefits of pregnancy yoga are endless. It will help you as you progress through each stage of pregnancy, connecting you with your unborn child, and giving you the techniques for a relaxed and stress free birth for both mum and baby. It is one of the best forms of exercise during pregnancy, a gentle and safe means of keeping fit without strain.

Our aim at Crystal Conscious is to give you peace of mind – teaching breathing techniques to help you prepare and take you through labour, increasing your health, self-confidence and sense of well-being also keeping you physically fit with some asana practice (yoga postures) maintaining flexibility, gaining strength and stamina. Also pregnancy Yoga classes give you the chance to spend time with other pregnant women which is always comforting, knowing that you are in company of other mums to be who are experiencing the same changes and feelings as you, and being able to share those experiences in a warm and friendly atmosphere.

What the classes cover

• Yogic breathing, birth breathing
• Strengthening birthing muscles
• Pelvic floor exercises
• All over strengthening toning and maintaining flexibility
• Useful birth positions, visualisation and relaxation techniques to promote gentle birth.
• Mental and emotional preparation for birth.
• Breath and movement in labour for energy and pain management.
• Chanting to relax you and baby
• Top tips for birthing partners.
• Nutritional advice – eating the right diet and having the highest possible available nutrients is an invaluable gift that a woman can give to her baby. Before conception, during pregnancy and throughout breastfeeding, high levels of nutrients are important to ensure that your baby develops properly
• Relaxation techniques
• Benefits of pregnancy yoga empowers mum-to-be to have conscious birth experience
• Keeps you fit whilst being sensitive to you and your unborn baby
• Increases energy
• Improves circulation
• Helps in decreasing anxiety
• Strengthens pelvic floor
• Provides exercises that you can practice at home during your pregnancy.
• Helps to quicken postpartum recovery

The yoga techniques help you to develop strength and flexibility in your body, and to cope more easily with the many changes that take place both physically and emotionally. This helps the body and mind to be well prepared for pregnancy and birth. Yogic breathing along with the pelvic floor exercises connect you in advance with your birthing muscles, (giving you confidence), especially if you are a first-time mother. Your pregnancy posture will improve, and this can allow a rapid recovery of muscle tone after the birth.

Preparing for the physical demands of birth – and motherhood itself.

At Crystal Conscious Yoga we also offer partner workshops giving practical support to couples preparing for labour, these are separate classes and are generally held as a one off to each couple individually, or in a group setting depending on what the couple wants. These workshops are very beneficial as it obviously helps to have a birth partner who is aware of the techniques and practices you will be using during the birth of your baby. Also we aim to cover some of the topics of transitioning to parenthood. Each birth is unique and with Crystal Conscious Yoga we strive to give special attention to each new mother (and father), whether she is having her first baby or she is a busy mother already.

Bring strength and happiness to mind and body through yoga

When to practise

Be conscious of how your body feels and seek medical advice regarding any health issues.

General guidelines are that you:

• rest during the first trimester
• start yoga in the second trimester
• continue your classes up until due date (or in some cases even beyond)
• take up postnatal classes after birth

It’s never too late to practise prenatal yoga! So whatever stage in your pregnancy, come along and experience the benefits of yoga under the care of our expert pregnancy yoga teacher.

Postnatal Mum and baby yoga

Postnatal parent and baby classes are open to complete beginners of yoga or to those with some previous experience. They offer a safe friendly environment for positive encouragement of movement, and the stimulation of touch, supporting the baby’s individual development, strengthening the physical body and maintaining flexibility. Tactile stimulation has also been found to contribute to the development of the brain and nervous system.

Post natal

Some of the practices may help improve sleeping patterns and help to settle fractious babies, also the massage techniques may help with colicky babies and aid digestion.

The classes enable mums and/or Dads to feel more confident in handling their newborn babies, showing a variety of lifts and carries and some other useful techniques. The shared experience for parents and babies creates a mutual understanding of trust and sensual pleasure and delight.

Post natal yoga

We also endeavour to look after postnatal Mums by ensuring that their pelvic floor is not forgotten and bringing some much needed rest and recuperation time into the classes, while keeping a mindful eye on how to keep everyone happy.

Post natal classes

As you may imagine the classes can be very varied and are a joy to be a part of, every class is different but our aim is for everyone to leave feeling nurtured and relaxed. Don’t forget even if your baby is crying and doesn’t want to settle, there will be plenty of other Mums who are experiencing the same things, and these classes are a good place to share any worries or provide useful titbits of information for other mums making the journey into motherhood a more pleasurable one.

What does the class entail?

Yoga Asanas

• All the yoga postures (asanas) are modified so that they can be done with your baby.
• We look at the importance of taking care of the spine and shoulders helping you cope with the physical demands of feeding and carrying your baby.
• Specially designed postures are used to regain the strength of the abdominal muscles and pelvic floor which have possibly been weakened from the effects of pregnancy and childbirth.
• Exercises in the class are combined with nursery rhymes for mental as well as physical development and for fun!
• Babies have a great sense of humour and love the combination of movement and songs.

Working with the Breath

The breath when used effectively helps to stabalise the emotions bringing a sense of calm to the mind

The first few months after child birth can sometimes prove quite testing even for the most centred souls, the right breathing techniques can really help.

Relaxation

The classes include some great relaxation techniques which can hopefully help you cope with less sleep.

Some of these practices will be simple enough for you to be able to use them at home on your own should you need to.

Using this time and space to feel you can make new friends for you and your baby and feel connected with other mums and dads experiencing the same kind of things.

About the teacher Tanya Carter

Tanya was trained by Uma Dinsmore-Tuli who designed the modules for both pregnancy and post natal yoga for the British Wheel of Yoga and who is one of the founders of the Sitaram partnership.

Tanya has trained in post natal yoga and is also fully qualified in pregnancy yoga and has teacher training qualification in Ashtanga yoga and Kundalini.

Tanya is a full time professional yoga teacher with Thirty years of practice and over fifteen years of teaching experience, teaching pregnancy, post natal and conscious yoga either on a one to one basis or at class level. She is also a very qualified Mum of two.