Embracing motherhood is not an easy task. Besides the beauty of creating another life inside you for nine months, you undergo a range of physical and emotional upheavals. The morning sickness, the cramps, the growing baby’s health, the thoughts about financial adjustments, etc., can make you feel a little down till such time that you give birth to your little prince or princess.
Sometimes, you might lose your emotional balance too. While you’re struggling to find happiness during your pregnancy, you need to take care of a few things that can make you feel stress-free and happy. Your going through this nine-month journey, doesn’t mean you’d have to stop smiling and stop feeling happy.
Here are a few suggestions for you to keep yourself pepped up while you’re going through your pregnancy mood swings.
Engage Yourself in Doing Yoga and Practising Mindfulness
Experts from the American Pregnancy Association prefer you go to pregnancy-safe yoga classes. But, somehow, if you aren’t in a position to attend the classes, you can get a pregnancy-trained trainer to your house. So, whether you’re in your first trimester or last, practice yoga asanas to keep your body in perfect balance and make you feel extremely positive.
Practice Meditation
Along with doing yoga asanas, practice awareness around your thoughts, to deal with your emotional upheavals. Spend only 15 minutes with yourself, while you’re practicing meditation. Take deep breaths, while you’re practicing meditation, and don’t forget to pay attention to your thoughts. This is going to help you control your stress and anxiety, reduce your pregnancy hypertension, relieve you from pain, and improve your rest & sleep.
Give Aromatherapy a Try
A whiff of a sweet smell can take you back to a certain time of your life or you might just enjoy it. Yes! That’s how powerful scents are. So, if you can try aromatherapy, it will reduce your blood pressure naturally and slowly take the stress factors away from you. But, before you give aromatherapy a try, consult your doctor about the essential oils that you can use.
Spend Some Quality Time With Your Loved Ones
Since your hormones are responsible for your bodily changes and changes of emotions, it’s essential that you feel close and connected to your near and dear ones. So, whenever you feel the need to connect with your near & dear ones, especially during this interesting phase of your life, just do it. Talking to friends, relatives, and your partner will help you find your calm.
Join Online Communities
You can also join online communities where you can meet fellow expecting mothers and start connecting with them. Bonding and communicating with someone who is going through the same phase of their life as you will become easy. They will understand how you’re feeling at which stage of your pregnancy. Sharing your feelings will naturally reduce your stress and anxiety.
Get a Lovely Prenatal Massage Done
If you need to boost your mood, a prenatal massage is just the thing you need. Prenatal massage is a great way to relieve you from muscle tension, aches, and pain. All you need is a specialist who knows the techniques at the tip of his or her fingers. Getting a belly massage, scalp massage, and a foot and back rub done are some of the wonderful massaging techniques that you can go for, to manage your stress and anxiety levels.
Join Antenatal Classes
You can attend antenatal classes with your partner. The experts in the antenatal classes will help you prepare for your upcoming role through exercise, as well as training on pregnancy, and labour thus reducing your anxiety levels and boosting your confidence. One of the added advantages of joining an antenatal class is that you’ll be able to meet a few other expecting parents and connect with them. They will also tell you what to eat and how much to eat. They will guide you with your exercises. You will be advised to keep your hospital bags packed. Maybe someone will be there to guide you with cord blood banking too.
However, during the phase of your pregnancy, you must have thought that once you’ve given birth to your baby, you’ll feel stress-free. But that is far from the truth. Once you become a new mom, coping with the demands of the new baby takes a toll on your body as well as your mind. Sometimes, as a new mom, you’d feel life has gone completely out of control. However, here are a few things that can help you out as a new mummy while you’re trying to maintain your sanity.
Make “you” the Priority
Hit the spa, whenever you get some time. Or, spend some time reading – maybe your favourite book or journal. Watch your favourite. Do some gardening. Listen to your favourite music. Love yourself first. You’ll see your stress and tension slowly disappearing.
Spend Quality Time With Your Partner
Since your newborn little one has taken most of your time, your physical and emotional tiredness can make your relationship with your partner suffer just a little bit. Going out for a movie together, and spending some time over lunch or dinner can bring back the nostalgic romance between the both of you and can make you feel very happy.
Accept Help Whenever You Can
You may feel extremely tired after a few sessions of breastfeeding, you can always ask the help of your partner, to make your little burp, change the diaper, or sleep. There’s nothing wrong with it. You can rather get some rest at that time and feel less worried.
Besides these, attending a few counselling sessions, planning a proper diet, and doing exercise and meditation can keep you cool.
Postpartum stress and anxiety just like pregnancy depression is yet another challenge. With the above-mentioned tips, you can deal with it and prepare yourself to become a loving mother.