Getting harder.

image compliments of missouriplants.com

Bikram practice is definitely getting more challenging!  My third trimester officially started yesterday which means I'm in the twelve-week countdown period until my due date!  This coincides with a greatly enlarged belly, decreased lung capacity, and all the requisite lack in stamina that goes along with those conditions.

I have found myself sort of huffing and puffing my way through the floor series which has always been the easier part of class for me.  Just moving up and down from pose to savasana is awkward and tiring by the end of class so I've made some adjustments.  There are times that I stay sitting up from rabbit through the end of class since situps are out at this point as well.

Yesterday was my marathon take then teach two classes back to back as I do most Mondays.  I did not work my hardest in the standing series because I knew I needed the energy left to teach.  Normally, when I practice, I emerge energized and ready to blast the students with my energy - but during pregnancy especially the back half of pregnancy it doesn't really work that way.  There's not a bunch of extra energy floating around to tap into.

Not maxing out meant honoring my heartburn and not going too deep into forward bends (hands on the floor in front of me for padahastasana and sep legs stretching) and for the first time, and this is sad to me, but I put my elbow on my knee for the first set of triangle.  I did do the second set.  Still, even with all of these modifications, I was sweating and working hard in class.  In our studio, we substitute full wheel (backbend) for bow pose as an I'm-feeling-awesome-and-strong modification.  We also can do the standard hip raise instead.

I tried to push up into wheel and it didn't feel very good in my mid-back.  So... I'm going to try to be flexible (ha ha) and allow myself the chance to do/not do what feels right at that point for the rest of my pregnancy.  There was a time where I felt like the pregnancy modifications were taking away from my class but now as I approach the end I couldn't practice without them.

With the entrance to my third trimester I'm looking forward gratefully to the days when my babe is on the outside of my body and I can return to practicing real Bikram!!!!  Even if it's in a hot closet in my house early in the mornings when I've had no sleep, I'm craving those forward bends and compression poses like no one's business.