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On July 22nd I will turn 40.  I typically don’t make a big deal out of my birthday and don’t particularly enjoy being in the spotlight.  This year, I do feel like celebrating though.  More of a quiet, introspective celebration of all that I have learned (and have yet to learn) and all that I have to be grateful for.  

Here’s what I have learned:

1. You can’t depend on someone else to make you happy.  You have to learn all the big and...

Diastasis Rectus Abdominus is an abnormal separation of the rectus abdominus (“6-pack”) muscles that occur from the excessive, repetitive force on the connective tissue of the abdominal wall.  While this condition is not unique to the pregnant individual, pregnant women are more vulnerable to this condition due to their hormonal environment combined with the excessive forward pressure placed on the connective tissue from the growing uterus.  Some statistics report that...

In Week 3 of my Postnatal Pilates class our topic is “Let’s Talk About Sex (after) Baby.” The reasons most women don’t want to have intercourse or don’t enjoy intercourse can usually be broken down into 3 main categories: 
Pain
Emotional Factors, and
Core Changes and Feeling stretched out “down there”

Let’s start with pain. Usually, pain is the result of decreased lubrication, scar issues, skin disorders or infection, and/or tight pelvic...

My 6 year old son recently celebrated 100 years of school in his Kindergarten class.  They were allowed to dress up like 100 year old people, and they were asked to bring in 100 items for counting and math practice (he chose cotton balls).  He was so excited to show me the paper he worked on, outlining all the things he will do when he is 100 years old.  In addition to having “gray hair”, a “beard” and a “mustache” (a very hairy 100 year old...

Menopause is diagnosed retrospectively 12 months after the last menstruation and occurs on average at the age of 52 in the United States.

Perimenopause is the time prior to menopause that can start in a woman’s 40s and last 6 years or longer. Because women are living a third of their lives AFTER menopause, it serves them well to take stock of how they are treating their body leading up to this transition so they can make some changes to be optimally healthy heading into menopause.

Many...

In a fascinating post by writer, blogger, and brain injury survivor Debbie Hampton, I learned that a thought is an electrochemical event taking place in your nerve cells producing a cascade of physiological changes.  

There are thousands of receptors on each cell of our body that are receptive to one particular peptide or “juice” from a thought.

When we have feelings of doubt, fear, joy, anger these “juices” flow throughout the body and connect with those matching...

I love the Pilates mermaid stretch!  It accomplishes so many things for my pregnant mamas, it feels so good, and it’s such a pretty move.  This is perfect for pregnant women who feel they are “running out of room” in their torso.  

It’s also a lovely exercise for pregnant women experiencing numbness and tingling in the upper extremities (once more serious nerve involvement has been ruled out).  While we most often think of these symptoms as relating...

“I fell into a burnin’ ring of fire
I went down, down, down
And the flames went higher
And it burns, burns, burns
The ring of fire, the ring of fire” —-Johnny Cash

Ah, the dreaded “ring of fire.”

Pregnant women shudder at the mere thought of the commonly described moment as the baby’s head is crowning.  Couldn’t we paint a more loving picture of the moment directly before a mother meets the child she has been growing in her belly for nine...

Boot Camp:
1) A military training camp for new recruits with strict discipline;
2) A prison for youthful offenders, run on military lines;
3) A short, intensive, and rigorous course of training.

I rest my case.  

The words “Mommy” and “Boot Camp” do not belong in the same sentence together. Or at least a boot camp should not be a “Mommy’s” first choice of exercise post-baby.  

I like to compare your core to a house. The roof of your...

I am suffering from decision fatigue.  How do I know?  I swore at the gas station pump.  The F-bomb and everything…almost as if the pump was maliciously out to “get me.”

It started innocently enough.  I let my gas tank get dangerously low.  I knew I needed to pull into a gas station and soon. I chose the first convenient station in my path.  I am not one of those people who will make a U-turn and cut across traffic to save a penny a...