Swimming In Pregnancy: What Benefits?
Swimming during pregnancy is one of the most often recommended sports practices, especially due to the ability of water to absorb the weight of the whole body.
Precisely this feature allows pregnant women to perform movements that would be difficult out of the water. Indeed, it is precisely the water pressure that prevents you from making sudden movements, which in turn largely reduces the risk of injury.
Water contributes to feeling not only lighter – despite the weight of the womb – but also more relaxed, which allows you to get rid of the tension that all pregnant women feel in the back. At the same time, a low-intensity swimming session improves muscle tone in the legs, pubis and buttocks, which are stronger during childbirth.
Swimming stimulates circulation, which benefits from the horizontal position taken while swimming; an exercise that prevents varicose veins, swelling and cramps in the legs, while increasing lung resistance without causing physical fatigue.
Before starting with your pregnancy swimming lessons, go to the doctor
Although swimming is certainly one of the most recommended exercises for pregnant women, the ideal is that before enrolling in these classes, you should consult your doctor to evaluate your physical health conditions, your family history and the conditions of your pregnancy. All this will help you in determining the conditions of the physical activity you will perform in the water.
There are a few things your gynecologist will need to consider before you can start swimming ; in fact, this exercise, however noble and comprehensive, is contraindicated for women who are facing a high-risk pregnancy, and also for those suffering from a threat of premature birth.
It is not an activity rich in benefits even when the pregnant woman has a placenta previa or a delay in uterine development, vascular problems or dilation of the cervix.
Along with this, pregnancy, according to the specialists of the Italian Foundation for Heart Health, is in no case the ideal time to learn to swim, nor to resume physical activity after long periods of sedentary lifestyle.
This is why it is important to have a medical check-up before you start swimming. In addition, it is important that you do not get tired during physical activity, rather try to move gently and relax.
Swimming during pregnancy helps you relax
If your doctor has advised you to exercise during pregnancy, you will find that swimming in a pool has several benefits at this stage of life.
For example, one of the benefits of swimming is that it helps to relax the whole body, and, in particular, those areas under stress due to the weight of the unborn child; in fact it helps to redistribute weight and relax the joints.
Swimming also contributes to the improvement of the cardiovascular system and improves muscle tone while reducing vascular edema. Furthermore, it makes the body more flexible and helps to acquire greater physical resistance, without however straining the body.
Other benefits of swimming
Other benefits of swimming during pregnancy are that this physical activity helps to improve mood, as it reduces stress and nervous tension.
Staying in the water also helps you to know your body and to better deal with the changes that involve it. Furthermore, practicing swimming – for example with lessons lasting one hour – favors social relationships and helps prepare you for the long-awaited moment of childbirth.
As you can see, the benefits of swimming are many. So many that doctors still don’t all agree on when in pregnancy it is advisable to stop swimming.
Some specialists, in fact, claim that it is good until the moment of delivery, since water helps to improve the symptoms that worsen during the last months of pregnancy. These include cramps, swelling of the feet due to poor circulation, back pain due to the weight of the belly, to name a few.
Still, there are doctors who advise abandoning swimming lessons at the eighth month of pregnancy, as it is precisely then that the risk of breaking the water during the activity increases, without however the woman realizing it. The ideal is to always contact your doctor and follow his instructions.
