Refresh
Water Aerobics
Relax
Pre natal Yoga
Revive
Belly Dancing
Birth Zone retreats are about bringing your mind and your body into alignment, in order to ease your experience of birth.
Birth Zone retreats are about bringing your mind and your body into alignment, in order to ease your experience of birth.
To do this, we acknowledge the importance of education to prepare you for decision making and removing the fear and mystery surrounding birth. But we also acknowledge the importance of physical preparation, taking care of your body and valuing your health and wellness.
We have selected teachers who specialise in working with the pregnant form, so that they can be sensitive to your changing needs.
Water Aerobics
When you are growing heavier every week, especially in the warmer months, imagine gently easing yourself into the cool refreshing water of a pool, alleviating that niggling backache and massaging your muscles with the water as you move.
The American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (ACOG) has pronounced gentle aqua aerobics safe during pregnancy, so you can enjoy the comfort of being supported by the water, along with the many health benefits, with peace of mind.
As the water is only chest height for water aerobics, it is not necessary to be able to swim and the pool is always covered by a life guard to ensure the safety of the guests.
Because when you exercise in water you reduce the risk of falling and hurting yourself, you give your abdominal muscles an opportunity to safely engage and lengthen as they work to keep you balanced, enabling deeper stretches and more toning.
Pregnant women can benefit from low-impact workouts in water as they are easier on the joints, which makes it possible to comfortably perform more repetitions than you could on land.
Exercising during pregnancy improves your mood, relieves body pain, pressure on the joints and muscles and can help towards preventing constipation.
Walking or jogging in the water are wonderful low impact ways to strengthen the core muscles and hips.
Aqua aerobics classes relieve stress, include aerobic endurance, resistance training, and enjoyable music. So they create the perfect ambiance to keep your mind and body calm.
Aqua aerobics is an excellent method to increase your blood circulation and cardiovascular function. It is also is an effective way to prevent oedema, or fluid retention, in your extremities.
There is evidence to suggest that exercising during pregnancy can lead to a lower incidence of requests for epidurals; just as you wouldn't run a marathon without training and expect to win, birth can make difficult demands of your body, that you can strengthen it to meet.
Yoga
Yoga helps you to adjust to the physical and mental demands of pregnancy, labour, birth, and Motherhood. It calms both mind and body, providing beneficial physical and emotional stress relief. Taking a prenatal yoga class is also a great way to meet other mums-to-be and embark on this journey together.
Recent research from The University of Manchester has shown that attending a weekly pregnancy yoga class can be reduce anxiety and depression by up to a third.
Classes can offer a regular time for the Mother to connect with the baby, when a hectic world of work, family and home may distract her from really accepting and welcoming the changes that she will need to be prepared for. In our society with very little maternity leave and many women working up until the final days of pregnancy, this time is invaluable.
A strong focus during these classes is on preparing the body for the birth, to create strength and stamina whilst releasing muscular tension and joint stiffness, particularly around the pelvis. This allows baby the freedom to move into a good position and makes sure the pelvis is receptive to opening and losening, to aid a smooth and easy birth.
Many of the movements, particularly those on all fours, encourage baby into an optimum position for birth. This becomes increasingly important in the latter part of the pregnancy. During labour if the baby is in the optimum fetal position the head can stimulate the cervix, which will encourage thinning and opening of the cervix and well paced progress of labour.
If you have attended pregnancy yoga classes you will have these movements in your “muscle memory” and will understand the benefits of these positions to your body. Therefore you are likely to find that you instinctively use some of your yoga movements.
Belly Dancing
Belly Dancing for pregnancy and labour is not a modern concept, it was in fact developed centuries ago. Women from Egypt, Morocco, Hawaii, New Zealand, India and many other countries have been doing circle-dances or belly dancing for hundreds of years.
There are several different types of belly dance but most of them involve slow, undulating and rolling motions, such as hip circles and figure-of-eight movements. Many woman in labour instinctively move in similar circular motions, as it's a natural way to get your baby in an optimum position for birth.
These are just some of the benefits:
• Strengthening pelvic, deep abdominal muscles and all the muscles specifically used during giving birth, thus facilitating
the childbirth and recovery process.
• The music is rhythmic and can help you 'zone out'.
• Great for relaxation and relieving stress.
• Encourages the baby into a forward (anterior) lying position; which is the optimal position for labor and birth.
• It can help to move a posterior baby into a better position.
• Improving self-confidence and positive body-image.
• Aid and encourage good posture.
• Help maintain general fitness levels.
• Promote good balance and co-ordination.
• Relieves pregnancy back pain.
• Improves abdominal control and awareness.
• Helps maintain pelvic floor tone and therefore reduces chances of post natal uterine prolapse.
• Help you meet other expectant Mums if you attend a class.
Belly dancing is designed perfectly to bring a women’s body into balance. The muscles of the uterus move the baby in a clock-wise corkscrew fashion. Belly dance moves enhance this natural action.
The leg movements will strengthen your legs for labour as it is great exercise for the gluts, thighs and calf muscles.
This may be the first time you will have tried anything like this and on the retreat is a perfect place to start - surrounded by women who understand and are going through the same process to reconnect with their bodies in preparation for a very physical event.