Maternity... Yoga? & Weight Gain in Pregnancy

Being a foreign mother-to-be is an exciting, interesting, and sometimes stressful experience. Advice considered standard in your birth country is seen as outrageous to the native population. Or, the opposite - you hear doctors and midwives give you advice that would be laughable if you mentioned it back home! In the months leading up to the birth of our firstborn in Japan, I'll be posting my experiences; simply to help me process them, and also for the information of anyone else who may be about to go through the same!

I chose to give birth, if all goes well, in a little midwife centre in Nagoya. My midwife is practical, professional, and fun. She offers free maternity yoga classes to all patients, so last week I decided to go along. The experience was interesting, to say the least!

The class took place in a tatami room upstairs. The smell of the straw mats and the breeze coming through the open windows were very refreshing. There was only one other attendee, and our "yoga" instructor (more about that later) was a midwife from another clinic. After I got settled, we began the class.

First, we did self-introductions. Our name, due date, and whether we had any physical symptoms to complain of. The other lady went first: her due date was close to mine, and she mentioned that she was gaining more weight than she wanted to.

This is where things got interesting.

A short explanation, first of all: Japan is known for its strict weight gain guidelines for pregnant women. A recent article discusses how too little weight gain, and consequently small birth weight for babies, may be impacting the general health of the nation. I won't discuss the health & science behind it, but I also was advised to watch my weight gain. My midwife was more generous than some, it seems: she said that no more than 7 kilograms is recommended, but then looked at me and said, "You're small. Up to 10kg is fine."

Thank you, good doctor.

Back to yoga class: after introductions, the instructor took the other pregnant lady's weight lament as a springboard for a 10 minute lecture on weight gain. She said that more than 6 kilograms means you're just getting fat. It will be hard to give birth to the baby and you won't lose weight afterwards. Also, it's better to keep your baby small. Little weight gain will help that too. Birth small, raise big.

Her lecture also included, as an example, an overweight patient of hers who gained no more than 5kg throughout the entire pregnancy. Her secret? Her only snack was beans. Dried beans. (Let's just say I felt extremely guilty about taking the cookie that was offered as an after-class snack...)

This lecture didn't surprise me, but it did offend me a little, coming from a country where the general advice for weight gain in pregnancy is 10 to 12.5kg. I also felt some righteous anger on behalf of the poor mom beside me getting weight-shamed. She was cute and pretty and, to me, looked like a normal pregnant lady. Not cool, man.

After the lecture finished, with us feeling sufficiently somber about our weight and me trying to remember if I had dried beans anywhere in the house to snack on, we started the "yoga".

The quotation marks are for a reason. Maybe I should say, foot yoga? Reflexology yoga?

The majority of the 2 hour class involved twirling our toes around, massaging pressure points in our feet, and stretching our ankles. As our instructor watched us manipulate our toes one-at-a-time, she would comment on our general health based on how well our toes stretched. You must have backaches, no? Clearly you have constipation. The little toe will help with that. You can't see your toe knuckles? That's no good. Here are some exercises to fix that.

Amused, bewildered, and wondering at the science behind it all, my feet actually felt great after the session. It was like a self-given foot massage. Whether it cured my constipation or tense shoulders... not so certain.

The final part of the class was spent on breathing exercises. This was what I found the most useful (and relaxing!). We were taught how to breathe deeply, with our stomachs instead of our chests, and practised breathing for labour. (I've read that breathing exercises lose their thrill after about 16 hours of contractions, but I'll give it my best shot.) We were also told to feel our stomachs and see how tense they were, and then learn how to relax the muscles.

Class finished with tea and cookies. Did I mention how guilt-inducing those cookies were? If it had been beans, I would have understood.

On the whole, it wasn't a bad experience. It was a bit uncomfortable emotionally and the effectiveness of the techniques is still debatable (any expert info on that would be greatly appreciated). When I described the "foot yoga" to my husband, he was more annoyed than I had been, since his only concern during pregnancy has been me staying fit by getting enough exercise.

Tomorrow there is another yoga class, which may or may not be offered by the same instructor. If it involves more toe-twirling... I may turn to Teacher YouTube for maternity yoga instead!

Comments

Popular Posts