When you add Yoga to your daily routine, you’ll be able to see immense benefits to your emotional and physical well-being. If you have any specific questions about whether certain Yoga poses are safe to practice during your pregnancy, talk to your OB. Use a mindfulness app

Introducing 'Mindful Pregnancy' - a practical and inspiring step-by-step photographic guide to keep you and your baby happy and healthy during your pregnancy journey. If you're a yoga-loving, mindful mum-to-be looking for sound advice on how to enjoy a natural, stress-free pregnancy, then this is the book for you! In addition to main effects, we were interested in baseline individual difference characteristics that might blunt or boost effects of antenatal mindfulness training. In line with hypotheses, child-bearers with higher initial levels of anxiety symptoms showed a greater benefit of MIL—decreasing distress slopes through one- to two-years postpartum and lower ending levels of distress. This finding is consistent with prior work showing that people with higher starting levels of psychological symptoms derive the greatest benefit from MBIs [ 43, 57], and with the idea that mindfulness may function to interrupt the transdiagnostic processes that maintain anxiety and other distress-related symptoms [ 56]. Those with more trait-like and/or pronounced internalizing distress may be especially prone to the automatic reactive processes targeted by mindfulness principles and practices. Mindfulness training brings greater awareness of such automatic reactivity and provides a new approach to the person-experience relationship that is present focused, decentered, accepting, and nonjudgmental [ 58]. Mindfulness-related gains in flexible appraisal, acceptance of experiences, and positive affect in turn support adaptive coping with perinatal stressors and ultimately mother and child health [ 15]. By altering the course of at-risk child-bearers’ distress, MIL thus has the potential to exert cascading effects on stress resilience across generations. The Mindfulness-Based Childbirth Education (MBCE) protocol was developed specifically for this study and included participants as active learners through group work, role play and decision-making practice using the BRAIN (benefits, risks, alternatives, intuition, nothing) model for decision-making, as well as incorporating daily mindfulness meditation homework. The programme ran over 8 consecutive weeks; each session was approximately 2.5h. Pregnant women and their birth support partners (e.g. husband, partner, mother, friend) attended. Participants had homework CDs with mindfulness meditation instructions and a workbook to use during the week between sessions. Daily practice of techniques learned was encouraged. In addition, participants had assigned reading, usually related to prenatal information content. Each session was run by the principal investigator, a qualified childbirth educator, specialist antenatal yoga teacher and mindfulness meditation teacher. Sessions were co-facilitated by an assistant who was a registered yoga and meditation teacher. Prenatal education and mindfulness were incorporated into each session. The education part of the programme provided women and their support persons with the knowledge and skills to assist in making informed choices regarding their pregnancy, birth and parenting. To meet this aim, participants were provided with evidence-based information regarding their choices. Participants engaged in a wide range of learning activities (group discussion, role play, problem-solving activities) to prepare for birth and early parenting and were taught mindfulness exercises/meditations to develop nonreactive, present-moment awareness. They learned how to apply the practice of mindfulness to discomfort during pregnancy, labour pain and early parenting.Mindfulness is not about trying to achieve some blissful state. Instead, it's about creating space for yourself to think and breathe. Here are some tips for practicing mindfulness while pregnant. women in 15–28weeks of gestation recruited to antenatal psychotherapy groups—interpersonal ( n=18) or mindfulness-based therapy ( n=20) Kraemer HC, Wilson GT, Fairburn CG, Agras WS. Mediators and moderators of treatment effects in randomized clinical trials. Arch Gen Psychiatry. 2002;59(10):877.

Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy for perinatal depression. The 8-session protocol for MBCT-PD was based on the standard MBCT treatment manual and theory that proposes that individuals with histories of depression are vulnerable during dysphoric states, during which maladaptive patterns present during previous episodes are reactivated and can trigger the onset of a new episode. The standard MBCT protocol was modified for use in the context of pregnancy and in anticipation of the postpartum. Modifications included stronger emphasis on brief informal mindfulness practices, given our developmental work that suggested that barriers of time, energy and fatigue are significant among pregnant women, and perinatal-specific practices. Loving kindness meditation practice was included based on the authors’ developmental work suggesting that self-criticism is a common theme among at-risk pregnant and postpartum women and that connection with one’s child is a powerful motivator for learning and practice. Loving kindness meditation practice asks women to direct awareness and positive intention at both the self and the baby through the repetition of specific phrases (e.g. “May I/my baby be filled with loving kindness. May I treat myself/my baby with kindness in good times and in hard times. May I/my baby be well and live with ease.”). Psychoeducation about perinatal depression, anxiety and worry, which are often co-occurring with depressio Reporter Susan Freinkel follows two expectant couples from their first class in mindfulness-based childbirth to the blessed (not to mention challenging) event. From Mindful’s August 2013 issue.

This gives you practice time to cultivate the open-hearted, nonjudgmental presence that can help deal with stressors whether during pregnancy, labour or post-delivery." Ireland—recruitment took place in the antenatal outpatient department and a private consultant clinic. Posters and leaflets were made available in various locations including general practitioner surgeries, medical centres and birth classes. Vieten C, Astin J. Effects of a mindfulness-based intervention during pregnancy on prenatal stress and mood: results of a pilot study. Arch Women's Ment Health. 2008;11(1):67-74. doi:10.1007/s00737-008-0214-3

Australia—participants recruited from hospital antenatal clinic, childbirth education and physiotherapy classes. During pregnancy, the body and mind both go through incredible changes. Garbus says she has seen mindfulness used to help some of the temporary discomforts of late pregnancy, as well as some of the emotional rollercoasters of pregnancy.Mindfulness is a calm and serene mental state anyone can achieve by simply focusing on the present moment. It may sound basic, but research suggests that being mindful greatly benefits pregnant women. Aside from feeling peaceful and more positive, the advantages of mindfulness practice include everything from a reduction in the risk of premature birth to an increased chance of healthy fetal development. If you want to try a mindful pregnancy, it’s easy to start today. All you need are this guide and a few moments to yourself. Choose one or more of the activities below. Repeat them for at least a week to enjoy results. Best of all, you can use the skills you’ve learned to stay relaxed during labor. How to practice mindfulness in pregnancy We can feel more able to concentrate, more engaged in life, less preoccupied and simply notice more of the beauties and pleasures of moment-to-moment life. This is vital for the parent-child interaction, which relies on the parent’s awareness of the child’s behaviour, and lays down an important foundation for the child’s later social, emotional, and cognitive abilities. If we are more preoccupied with our own concerns, then we are not available to notice the little signals that our babies are pre-programmed to make and allow them to thrive, which form the basis of secure attachment and their future cognitive development. How to use mindfulness in pregnancy and childbirth Teasdale JD, Segal ZV, Williams JMG, Ridgeway VA, Soulsby JM, Lau MA. Prevention of relapse/recurrence in major depression by mindfulness-based cognitive therapy. J Consult Clin Psychol. 2000;68(4):615–23.

of 4 treatment group participants (75%) experienced a clinically reliable decrease in stress symptoms from baseline to post-treatment, with at least 1 participant reporting a reliable change on the majority of measures. In contrast, there was very little change in outcome scores within the control group. Post-partum outcomes indicate that as many as 67% of the treatment group participants experienced a positive change in their levels of stress and self-compassion, and half the participants reported a positive change in their depression scores as measured by the EPDS. Hofmann SG, Sawyer AT, Witt AA, Oh D. The effect of mindfulness-based therapy on anxiety and depression: a meta-analytic review. J Consult Clin Psychol. 2010;78(2):169–83. Another excellent way to incorporate mindfulness into your life is by practicing Yoga. Gentle Yoga poses can be highly beneficial for pregnant women, by increasing circulation and flexibility and even improving one’s ability to fall and stay asleep.

Get a good night’s sleep. It’s one of the biggest challenges during pregnancy and early parenthood. But if you make a habit of taking naps during pregnancy, you’ll most likely carry that forward after your baby is born. And if sleep isn’t coming easily, you can try some meditation practices aimed at body awareness. Significantly larger decrease in PSA scores in the mindfulness group ( p<0.05) than in the control group ( p<0.05). Significant decrease in PSA from baseline to 6-week follow-up in both the intervention group ( p<0.05) and in the control group ( p<0.05), with no significant difference between the 2 groups. Marginally significant group × time interaction in the model predicting change in PRA scores over time, p=0.07. Post hoc analyses showed a significant decrease in PRA scores in the mindfulness group ( p<0.05) but not in the control group) between time 0 and time 1. However, these effects were not sustained through time 2 assessment; PRA significantly decreased in both the intervention ( p<0.05) and control groups ( p<0.05) from baseline to 6-week follow-up. No significant group × time interactions were found in models predicting change in PSS, STAI or FFMQ (all p<0.10). Significant main effect of time in the FFMQ, p<0.0001, p<.05; STAI p=0.001; and p=.001 models, such that both groups experienced significant decreases in perceived stress and general anxiety and significant increases in mindfulness from time 0 to time 1 and from time 0 to time 2. Staneva AA, Bogossian F, Wittkowski A. The experience of psychological distress, depression, and anxiety during pregnancy: a meta-synthesis of qualitative research. Midwifery. 2015;31(6):563–73. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.midw.2015.03.015. A promising MBI developed for the perinatal period is the Mindfulness-Based Childbirth and Parenting program (MBCP [ 28, 36]). MBCP is a formal adaptation of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR [ 12, 37]) targeted at the needs of pregnant people and partners approaching childbirth. Alongside basic training in mindfulness through didactic content and guided meditation practices, MBCP offers content related to managing childbirth- and parenting-related stress and pain and building supportive relationships across the transition to parenthood [ 28]. Empirical evidence supports the intended impact and process of MBCP through increases in mindfulness (especially the nonreactivity facet) and positive affective states and decreases in pregnancy anxiety [ 28], stress, and depression [ 38]. A briefer adaptation of MBCP (4 rather than 9 weeks) also was shown to yield significant improvement in child-bearers’ stress, depression, and anxiety [ 39].