Prenatal Yoga

I have not attended my prenatal yoga class in 3 weeks and I have NEVER felt better.

Going for the yoga class meant that I'd take the rest of the week recovering from it- everything hurt. And my labmates teased me about how I waddled about even though I wasn't terribly far along in the pregnancy. People say that attending the classes regularly and performing those exercises every day are a good way of preparing and practicing for child birth. So what's the logic- you are undergoing a good deal of pain every week during the yoga class, so that your pain threshold increases and so the process of delivering a baby no longer feels as bad?

Yoga was tolerable when we had a particular teacher in the class- she was in her 50s, she had given birth when she was 47 (!) and she understood all the attendant aches and pains of pregnancy. Best of all, she was of the opinion that all most women wanted, was to stretch a bit, relax a bit and listen to some soothing music while letting go of all the stresses of the day. Unfortunately, this teacher was only the substitute. The real teacher came along four weeks ago and literally ripped apart this mild, soothing visage of prenatal yoga and gave it an aggressive, aerobic avatar.
The result? I was completely out of breath halfway through the class, but grimly held on till the end. My legs wobbled and I nearly lost my balance while walking back home from the class and I was in acute pain for the next two weeks. I couldn't turn over in bed without an acute terror of the oncoming pain, I couldn't breathe deeply because my ribs hurt and I couldn't walk without wincing.

Now I'm just pissed off. Fine, so maybe I'm out of shape, but who the heck says that anything has to be this hard? Who, in their right minds, would deliberately go about ruining their self confidence like this? It's bad enough knowing that you're no longer able to fit into your clothes, that you can't stop your stomach from rumbling every 4 hours and it's bad enough having to worry if your little kid is getting the right nutrients and having to juggle housework and real work and everything else. WHY would anyone want to put themselves through the torture of a workout that leaves one physically and mentally exhausted? And what kind of a twisted mind would think that experiencing pain during pregnancy will make one better prepared for child birth? The only thing it does is leave a lasting dread of the whole experience.

Prenatal Yoga, I wash my hands off you.

And today, striding along the corridor at a pace that definitely was not possible when I was doing yoga, I feel incredibly good about myself.