Pregnancy Signs & Symptoms, Week by Week Pregnancy Guide

There are a lot of people thinking about swimming while pregnant.

There are a lot of advantages of this activity, such as the fact that it uses both of the large muscle groups: the arms and the legs.

Even though it is of low-impact, it is a good cardiovascular exercise and it makes it possible for pregnant women to feel weightless.

Information about pregnancy swimming

This is the only activity during which women can escape feeling the extra pounds and there are few risks of injury. No matter what kind of aerobic exercise you have, you improve the ability of your body to process oxygen, which is good both for you and the baby.

Pregnancy swimming tones the muscles, improves circulation and also builds endurance and strength.

Swimming helps women burn calories, and it helps them feel less fatigued, helps with sleeping and it makes it easier for women to face all the physical and emotional challenges of pregnancy.

Safety tips

As it has been mentioned before, swimming while pregnant is a pretty safe activity. If you have been practicing it even before you got pregnant, there aren’t many changes that you have to do.

In case you haven’t been swimming before, you could start during pregnancy, but first talk to your doctor or midwife.

When starting pregnancy swimming you have to make sure that you stretch well during warm up and that you also have a cool down; avoid overexertion.

While women are in the water they may forget about the fact that they need to drink water. While there is no general guideline regarding swimming while pregnant, it is recommended to drink a cup of water before you start the activity and then drink one cup every 20 minutes. After you get out of the pool you should have another cup. If the weather is humid or hot you may need even more fluids.

The first trimester

In case you are thinking about pregnancy swimming, it may be best to swim for about 30 minutes every day (if you have the energy for it). You could be swimming in the morning to prevent the appearance of nausea and this way you could make sure that you will have energy during the rest of the day.

Second trimester

The best thing about swimming while pregnant is that you won’t have to cut down on the activity since it is light exercise for pregnant women. It is quite unlikely that you will have to change your routine, but you may want to get a pregnancy swimsuit as the belly starts expanding.

Third trimester

The advantages of pregnancy swimming include the fact that the water supports the ligaments and joints so that your body can’t overheat and you won’t get injured either. During this trimester you should be using the breaststroke because it shortens the back muscles and lengthens the chest muscles.

This fact is important for swimming while being pregnant because these are the two areas that get misaligned during pregnancy. Another good idea may be to use a snorkel to protect your neck from the pressure of bobbing up and down constantly when you want to breathe.

Strokes

The advantage of the breaststroke regarding pregnancy swimming is that in this case you don’t have to rotate your torso and there is less exertion. In the same time it can also counteract the strain from the back that is caused by the growing belly.

As you can see, there are a lot of advantages when it comes to swimming while pregnant and maybe you should try practicing too even if you haven’t been swimming until now.