My Journey to Healing my Diastisis and all the changes that go with it...

If you happened to read my last post you wold have read how I am learning so much right now about alignment and natural movement and how my mind is being blown right now with new concepts. I have been working hard these last 2 weeks since getting my splint to repair my DR (diastasis recti) and correcting my alignment in my body.

It must be working because 2 weeks ago my DR was a for sure 3 finger widths apart...yesterday when I checked it was 1 at the bottom and not quite 2 in the middle and top!!!! I cannot believe how much it has changed and how quickly.

Now this doesn't mean that I am out of the water yet. I have read that the gap can measure different widths at different times and since I am pregnant I will have increasingly more pressure being placed on my abs as baby gets bigger. But the main thing that excited me is that what I am doing is working.

What am I doing? Well, first off I started wearing a prenancy abdominal splint from thetummyteam.com. I love it! It is very comfortable (for what it is). I was/ am able to wear it 24 hours a day. You can take breaks if you need to but the only reason I did was to feel the baby moving with my hands when it was really active. But you can't just wear a splint and expect to get better. So I have been doing tummy safe whole body workouts (with pregnancy in mind) from www.fit2b.us .

At first I was just wanting to workouts that focused on core work...until I began learning about the real cause of a DR. In my last post I wasn't as learned as I am now about what a DR really is and what causes it. Most people think it can be caused by pregnancy but in reality the problem was there before I got pregnant. The problem was the way I carry my body and move or don't move.

I mentioned last time about how we have trained our bodies to sit all day long. What this has done is shortened certain muscles and possibly tightened others. Our bodies adapted from the time we were children to allow us the endurance to sit all the time because that is what we kept telling our bodies we needed to do. What this has done though is altered our bodies so that when we try to do other movements like standing or walking or any type of exercise, our muscles aren't shaped the way they originally were as children when we could climb up a tree like no one's business or even just run around like banshees all day long without feeling all the aches we do now.

We see the aches and pains as normal but I don't believe they are. Yes our bodies get older and can wear down in certain areas buy why is that people living in traditional cultures can work so hard physically into their old age and before 30 we start moaning when we stand up. Its because we aren't using our bodies!

If you break a leg and have it in a cast for weeks, then you take it off. The muscles in the leg have atrophied. You wouldn't expect yourself to start working on your leg intensely and in fact a lot of people have to go through physical therapy afterwards to gradually build up the ability to use it again. We have cast our whole bodies in a sense by immobilizing ourselves. A lot of our muscles have atrophied and don't function the way they were supposed to.

Whoa..what was the point of this post again? Oh yeah, my DR. Before I get carried away writing about everything I am learning let me  get back on point.

So on top of working my body, I have been learning about the proper alignment of our bodies and working to correct things that my body has adapted to doing like have my pelvis tucked out and my ribs thrusted forward. I correct myself every time I notice and I can tell the difference for sure. These little changes are what is actually necessary to heal a DR and prevent it from coming again.

Since I am pregnant and my body is shifting I won't be able to fully correct my alignment right now, well that and I have 20+ years of training my body to do the wrong thing to undo. But working now is going to ensure a healthy pregnancy and birth and will set me up for a quick recovery and starting point to continue to work on alignment after baby is born.

We, meaning Chris and I, are brainstorming ways to make our home more movement friendly (when we actually move into our own home). As if I weren't weird enough, I am really focusing on changing our lifestyle to include tons more movement in our life. I want my children to continue to move naturally and have the abilities they were created to have.

I know I always say this, but not sure how often I will keep posting. But I will try to stay up on our journey, more for me really. I want to document the changes in our life and the healing of my DR, because who knows one day maybe I will be teaching this stuff! I hope so anyways...

So go out today and MOVE! Go walk off the trail and feel your confused body waking up from its slumber.

My newest passion

Quick update...

We decided not to move after all. Chris was told there would be work through winter but once it started raining work dropped like usual. We could have tried to make it in the new house but it would have been tight. On top of that we are reconsidering moving away at all. After reviewing the numbers we won't be saving any more money by moving and we really have no desire to live in the area away from everyone we know. So instead we decided to move into my mom and stepdad's house for winter and then in a couple of months we'll reconsider moving.

In the meantime I want to talk more about things I'm passionate about especially things I know I'm always telling people about and things I'm learning about. Which leads me to the point of this post.

My last pregnancy my midwife noticed that I had a slight diastasis recti. At the time I had no idea what it was but after some research I wasn't too concerned with the size mine was at the time.  Then baby was born and I knew nothing about how it could get worse or how to prevent it from happening.

Before I became pregnant this go around I finally researched what exactly diastasis recti is. It is when your abdominal muscles that make up a six pack are separated creating a gap in between. It can be caused by pregnancy and is actually very common. During pregnancy a lot of pressure is placed on the tendon in between your muscles which causes them to separate. With proper alignment and healthy abs it can be prevented even during pregnancy.

I began working towards repairing the gap and was hoping to be done before getting pregnant. Having multiple pregnancies close together can make it worse or even cause it. But we've been blessed with another kiddo so I became more diligent to repairing the diastasis before baby comes.

When the move started coming up I was set back a bit but mostly because our internet crapped out at the time and I couldn't get good enough signal to watch my workout videos. I should have stayed diligent to at least walk but I chose not to.

Fast forward to after our move to my moms and I realized that the dr (diastasis recti) has gotten bigger. Uh oh...So I ordered a pregnancy splint to help heal and have been working out in hopes of healing my abs before baby comes or at the very least prepare them for birth and to be healed post partum.

But I say all this because in my research I happened across a blog by a bio mechanist who thinks just like Chris and i. Most of the things we believe about life come from a foundational thought of how did the Lord create us to be/live? Whether it be food, lifestyle, family values, or even movement, how did the Lord create us to function? He is the perfect designer and had reasons for why he made us and the world the way he did. So whenever we question an aspect of life we view it through that lense. A lot of things are presented in the word but the not so important to salvation things aren't so we must use critical thinking and common sense.

What does this have to do with having a diastasis recti? Well I don't believe that God created women's abs to be separated after pregnancy and in need of specific workouts or surgery to repair it. So what is the bigger problem that is causing this problem in so many women today?

From childhood we are taught both intentionally and unintentionally to sit whenever possible. And when we aren't sitting we are trying to find a way to sit as soon as possible. With tv, office jobs, chairs literally every where we go, toilets...I mean it doesn't end. And sitting is the antithesis to movement. But did God create us to sit still so much? Did he intends for us to have to work out in order to stay "healthy" or was his design meant for us to be moving most of the day which helps all systems in our body.

My mind is being blown with ideas and concepts that I'm reading from this blog and I'm thinking of ways to raise my children differently and to change our whole family's literally to be more active daily not just occasionally.

My hope is that I inspire you to do the same. Look it up and think about it. :)