# Bouncing back right after baby?



## jaydee (May 10, 2012)

Really depends on how your birth goes - if you don't have any tears or need to be cut to help with delivery then you might be OK but no guarantee you might not still be sore 
Doing your exercises to help tighten abdominal muscles helps everything go back into place but you should avoid too much strain and heavy lifting for a while or you'll run a high risk of prolapses later on in life


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## kellison (Nov 20, 2015)

I do not recommend riding only a couple of weeks after giving birth, even if there are no complications. Medically, your body will still be adjusting and organs and bones/joints will still be shifting. My OB/GYN didn't even want me to exercise until after 6 weeks, and we all know horseback riding requires a lot more muscles than just exercising! Haha. Granted, I did have a slight complication, but I had done research beforehand and even if I didn't have a complication, four weeks was the earliest to begin working out.

Once you feel ready to exercise, cardio is important. I found yoga helped me bounce back pretty quickly, too (I cannot stress enough that you should wait on that though. My bones were still doing funny things until 8 weeks PP). Once you can handle the cardio, weight lifting should be included (think squats, lunges, pushups, crunches, curls, etc). If you plan on breastfeeding, you may want to supplement with fenugreek and brewer's yeast to keep your supply up while exercising. Calories will be necessary too. As for vitamins, I kept taking prenatal vitamins and iron for the first two months.

Good luck!


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## tinyliny (Oct 31, 2009)

nursing causes contractions to help bring uterus back to size. 

but, unless the "show" is something like an in hand show, or mabye , at the most demanding, a Western Pleasure show , I would not recommend it at all. 
I could not put ANY weight on those girly bits for quite some time after my son was born. even the jostling on my milk swollen breasts (at that time) would have been agonizing.


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## boots (Jan 16, 2012)

Oh the memories.

I've _had to_ ride within a couple days of having two of my three.

The first time, hub showed up at the side door with his face covered in blood and spatters. He was riding a snakey little horse we dubbed "The Eel" because of its' conformation. He and the eel had gotten in a fight. But, several horses were out on a dirt county road (65 miles from town) because that's what he and eel had been doing. Moving the remuda.

He said, "I can't see. Will you hop on old Eel and take the string down to Black Coulee? I think he's okay now." 

He was. The pasture was 3 miles. At a working trot. Stood in the stirrups the whole way there and back. 4 days after having my oldest.

The second time, we had a horse missing and were worried about it. The pasture was rough and several thousand acres. No way to use a truck. I got to ride an more well-mannered one at a walk that time. We found the horse. It was just off by itself for some reason.

Not fun.


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