Postnatal Essential: Align

Hi, I'm Wendy. And I'm here to do a stability flow with you. For this, you're going to need a wooden dowel if you have one. Or you can just use a broomstick handle just a long dowel that is at least about three feet long. So we're gonna start with the dowel just in front of us.

Inhale, shrug your shoulders up (inhales) and exhale (exhales), slide your shoulders down. Inhaling up (inhales) and exhaling down (exhales). One more time. Inhale, shrug up and exhale ground down as you press through your feet. You can be on a ball or you can just be on a chair.

Reach those arms out in front of you, slide your shoulders back, hold onto that dowel with your wrists, nice and strong. And if you can try and even get your thumbs in front of the dowel. You're just gonna inhale, reach your arms up (inhales) and exhale (exhales), bring your arms down. Pressing through the feet inhale, reach up (inhale), and exhale down (exhales). Couple more, reaching up (inhales), and down (exhales).

Last one, inhale up (inhales), and exhale down. Bring your arms all the way back up, grounding down through the feet, rooting down and rising up, you're just going to inhale, dip to one side and exhale (exhales), right back up. Inhale and exhale (exhales) up. Try to keep that link through your waist. So try and think no wrinkles in your shirt (exhales).

As you reach over inhale strong with the dowel. Exhale up (exhales). Inhale, drawing that belly in (exhales). Last one, inhale up and exhale. Bringing the dowel in front of you, you're gonna exhale, curl and roll back.

And inhale, come on up (inhales), and exhale, start that curl as you roll back (exhales). And inhale, look up and reach up and exhale (exhales). And reach. Opening through the chest, arching that back (exhales), and up. See if you can bring your arms back behind your head just a little bit to get a little bit more opening through this chest and down.

Stay right here, you're gonna turn to one side. Inhale as you reach up and open, stay in that curl. Bringing the arms down and back to center, other side. Exhale as you twist, pressed into that dowel. Inhale, nice and strong, and exhale down.

Coming back to center. And again, rotating and reaching and lowering, and center and twist, and reach and down and center. One more time. As you twist, you're still staying along through the waist and open to the chest. Your arms are nice and wide on the dowel and down and center.

Come all the way up holding on to the end of the dowel if it's about three feet wide, all you're gonna do is see if you can stay a little bit curled through the low belly and bring the dowel back behind your head and just press your elbows out wide and then back up. So inhale, elbows go wide, and see if you can get the dowel just to brush the back of your skull and down. If your dowel's a little bit longer you can grab a little bit wider and that might help you get that dowel down just a little bit lower. Staying nice and strong, stabilizing that shoulder girdle. So here's where we're stable.

The shoulders are not going up even though the arms are going up. Last one and up. Bringing the dowel in front, back down on the floor here. Slide those shoulders down, stable through the pelvis and just draw that belly in. Stay nice and strong.

If you're on a ball you might walk your feet back just a little bit so you can have a little bit more stability underneath you. Or if you're on a chair slide yourself back just a little bit. Inhale, exhale, draw the belly in and see if you can just lift one leg up off of the floor and bringing it down. Other side, exhale, lift up on the pelvic floor, draw that belly in. Use that dowel to stabilize, and down.

And again, exhale as you lift up (exhales), and down (inhales), and up. With as little movement as possible on the ball (exhales), try to shift your weight as little as possible so you don't go to one side but try and go straight up instead, and down. Lifting up as the shoulder draw down and down. Go ahead and do a couple of circles on the ball. Release your low back if you need to.

You're gonna take that dowel and bring it back behind you. So it's about where your bra strap is, maybe a little bit lower. Roll it up and you can hold on to the dowel either with your forearms or with the palms of your hands if your dowel's long enough. This is gonna put you in this extension and try and open your ribs up. So see if you can kind of close the ribs up and focus on opening through the sternum instead.

So from here, you're just gonna inhale and as you exhale just think of reaching your palms away, your fingertips away from you, nice and long, and you're just gonna dip to one side again without moving the ball. Exhale, pull the belly in (exhales), and come up. Inhale, other side, as you dip, nice and long and exhale (exhales). It's like you're draping yourself over another big stability ball so you're not collapsing and dipping, pressing through the feet nice and evenly, and reach up towards the ceiling. You can even look up towards the ceiling and then look straight ahead and look up towards the ceiling as you think of reaching through the fingertips and back, try not to pinch those shoulder blades together behind you.

You've got that oppositional stretch going on with your upper body, with your arms reaching, and down. Go ahead and take that dowel and bring it back in front of you. And you're gonna hold onto the dowel underneath, reach through the fingertips. Exhale, just curl and roll back. Keep reaching through the fingertips and see if you can just do a little bit of a bicep curl and then reach the arms up and then down and then straighten.

And exhale, curl, press through those feet, stay grounded, keep that stability through the pelvis and down, and reach and down and out and then come all the way back up. Keep that dowel right in front of you. And again, you might need to walk it out in front just a little bit. Take your left leg and bring it on top of that right knee. Flex that foot and just hinge forward a little bit.

So try not to collapse, but stay lifted. Again, grounding down through the feet, use that dowel. Slide the shoulders down, get that nice stretch through the hips and then come back up. Other side, you're gonna take that foot, bring it up. You can hold the dowel out to the side or bring it back in front of you.

And again, just hinge forward if you wanna deepen that stretch. Taking a few breaths. And then go ahead and bring that foot down. Keeping that dowel right in front of you thinking about that pelvic stability now, you're going to hinge forward, again pressing into the floor with the dowel, sliding the shoulders down and see if you can just come up and back down (exhales). So inhale, as you exhale, draw the belly in.

Just come up a couple inches and back down and up and down. And this is a great thing to think about as you're lifting throughout the day, as you're getting up and out of your chair, or carrying or holding your little ones. As you come up, you wanna stay in this hinged position, ground down through the feet, and make sure that you're not sinking to one side of your hip or the other, especially as you're carrying your children. Last one, and down. Go ahead and take that dowel down to the floor and you can put one foot on it.

So you've got your toes on the dowel and you're just gonna roll the dowel along the bottom of your foot, pressing into the dowel as much as you want to, as much as feels comfortable for you. Spread those toes, pull the toes back towards the ankle. Get a nice little release at the base of the foot maybe going from one side to the other. And then go ahead and switch it out to the other foot. Same thing.

Just slide up and down the foot as you pull the toes back towards the ankle. If there's a spot that's a little bit tight you can spend a little extra time there. Roll off to the side. Maybe spend a little bit more time on the heel. And then go ahead and bring that dowel up, pressing down through the knees, sliding your shoulders down reaching out through the crown of your head.

Inhale, scrunch those shoulders up (inhales). And exhale (exhales), slide 'em down. Thank you for joining me for this stability workout.