What do those sophisticated words – diastasis recti – mean? Well, I forgot them the other day when I was speaking to another yoga teacher as I do not use it in my everyday vocabulary. But I recalled this diagnosis on my way home from the yoga studio. Diastasis means a separation and recti refer to the abdominal muscles that support our torso to keep us in the upright position. Diastasis recti is in simpler words a separation of abdominal muscles. Below is an illustration of a diastasis recti compared to the normal abdominal wall.
We often talk about equality between men and women nowadays but diastasis recti clearly discriminates men in terms of that pregnancy and postpartum effects are invariably experienced by women. And even among women it discriminates some women as it mainly occurs in those women who have been pregnant and given birth, especially if multiple times. When the baby bump starts to bulge out from the body, the abdominal muscles start sliding like doors opening sideways to give space to the growing foetus. This separation of abdominal muscles, mainly referring to sixpack or rectus abdominis, is also a quite common postpartum condition. But the nature is cunning and after the baby is delivered, the abdominal muscles start to slide back to close the gap. This healing process takes usually about 5-8 weeks. This is the reason why experts advise women to be careful with heavy duty exercising of abdominal muscles postpartum, especially during the first weeks after giving birth. If the mother is too harsh on herself, this counteracts the healing process and the abdominal muscles are not able to move properly back towards the midline.
Sometimes, due to various reasons – multiple pregnancies, too heavy exercising as mentioned above or too little exercising and a weak core to begin with, the sixpack will not slide back to where it is supposed to and leaves a rift or a gap around the navel area in the midline of the body. This is not a completely empty space of course, it is occupied by connective tissue which is called the linea alba, located between the abdominals. A bigger gap means that there is more of this tissue and that the abdominal muscles are a bit too far from each other. This makes it more challenging for the muscles to support the body with an important task: to keep the core toned and the body upright.
To check for diastasis recti you need to do the following:
- Lie on your back, knees bent and feet on the mat
- Lift your head off the floor, support the back of the neck with one hand
- Feel that your abdominal muscles are engaged
- Feel along pressing the fingers gently above and below the belly button with the other hand
- Start this examination by pressing with your fingertips on the midline
- Press your fingers first on the midline towards the ribcage from above the navel and then repeat towards the public bone below the navel
- If your fingers can easily press down and you feel a gap without any tension or pushback, this may signal that you have some form of diastasis recti. But only if the gap is more than 2 cm wide (three fingers)
If you can place three fingers horizontally to the gap, this may indeed mean that distance of the abdominals is a bit too wide. This does not necessarily mean that you became a mother recently – I have met many women who are unaware that they have this condition for years or who suspect that they may have it but have not bothered to get it officially confirmed. Always best do consult an expert, not just oneself. Knowing is the first step towards fixing or alleviating problems that this separation may cause. They can really improve the quality of life in situations where the lower back hurts, one is not fully in control of one’s bladder or feels generally weak and untoned in the abdominal area. Or has dreamed for a long time to get read of her belly pooch and has tried and tried but without success.
In yoga there are a number of poses which can aggravate this condition:
- If it is serious parting, one should be careful with backbends in general, definitely no wheel (Urdhva Dhanurasana) and no camel (Ustrasana) pose. There should be another awareness in engaging abdominal muscles in general with backbends – careful, conscious and slow – not going to extremes and far from testing the limits of the poses.
- Extreme stretches are definitely not good for postpartum mothers. Especially for women who are breastfeeding as they produce a hormone – relaxin – in their body and this makes their connective tissue a bit unstable for much longer time than during the pregnancy and the delivery itself, sometimes the ligaments and connective tissue are “relaxed” for up to two years after giving birth.
- Please note that bridge pose (Setu Bandha Sarvangasana) , even though regarded as a backbend, is very much advised, especially with slow and deliberate movements up and down
- Careful with plank pose, always activate stomach muscles, if with a serious condition, avoid this pose altogether
- Avoid poses where you lift the head and shoulders off the mat and engage stomach muscles in a less than 90 degree bend between the trunk and legs. Practicing boat pose (Navasana) is not recommended for women with diastasis recti.
- Careful with rotations (like Ardha Matsyendrasana, Parivrtta Parsvakonasana). They are extremely useful for the body otherwise but with this condition one should rotate with the principle “less is more”. If the abdominal area is already undertoned, heavy-duty rotations can aggravate the condition.
What are good yoga poses to support the recovery and toning of abdominal area?
- Bridge pose (Setu Bandha Sarvangasana) with a curly movement of the pelvis up and down, best in slow motion, like this one:
- Slow pelvic tilt while lying with the back on the mat and knees bent, Engage the muscles while slowly tilting and relax when lowering the pelvis back to the mat
- A kneeling pose on all fours with knee and arm extension of opposite sides. First lift them off the floor and extend and then draw the opposite elbow and knee towards each other until they touch and repeat this several times with both sides
- Legwork while lying with the back on the mat: tapping the toes of bent legs on the mat, or drawing the knees towards the chest and straightening them legs forward without letting them drop to the floor so the stomach is activly engaged.
With exercising the abdominal wall the only danger is our ego – impatience and the willingness to go too far and too fast. One really needs to treat oneself with a lot of love. This is not about introducing a boring and repetitive routine to one’s practice – we should follow this process how we transform our bodies with supportive exercising with full awareness and notice differences and small gains. For the very ambitious, it is otherwise easy to end up with a toned belly like the one on the photo which displays an unhealthy gap between the abdominal muscles around the belly button.
And as always, a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.
More info:
Check out the below link where you can take a look at some good exercises with photo illustrations:
https://www.whattoexpect.com/first-year/your-health/diastasis-recti-exercises/