So you're ready to get back into exercising after having your baby but not sure where to start? Here are six daily tasks to help you kickstart your fitness journey again.

Points to note before you get going

• Please please PLEASE check yourself (or get checked) for Diastasis Recti. The separation of the 'six pack' abdominal muscles is very common and often under-recognised by fitness professionals. Many women aren't even aware they have it. There are easy ways to treat this, however, many cookie-cutter fitness programmes have crunches or sit-ups that can make this issue worse which may lead to pelvic floor issues and lower back pain.
• Release any expectations you have on how fast your progress 'should' be, what your body used to look like and what you feel it 'should' look like. Growing a baby changes your body forever (remember that once you have a baby you are postpartum for life) and you don't need this kind of pressure to bounce back!
• Get clearance from your LMC or GP prior to starting exercise. Non-official recommendations to get back into 'normal' exercising are typically 6 weeks postpartum, or 10 weeks postpartum for a caesarean section or complicated delivery. These are only guidelines and medical clearance doesn't necessarily mean you're ready, so it's also important to listen to your body and honour its signals if it's saying 'no'.
• There are many things you can do to help pelvic floor strengthening even years after having baby. Getting back into jumps, heavy weights, strong abdominal work or high intensity exercise too soon may put you at risk for incontinence or even prolapse later on in life (as late as during menopause!).
• If you are not getting enough quality or quantity of sleep at night and/or are breastfeeding, over-exercising may affect your milk production or place too much stress on your body potentially leaning to burnout or adrenal fatigue. You definitely don't need this when you're looking after a new baby, so please be kind to yourself!
• This is a short period in your life and it's better to give yourself this time to heal and regain your strength slowly! Give yourself permission to get back into things gradually.

Many women get into mainstream exercising far too soon after having their baby. The below exercises may seem too easy; especially if you were an active exerciser beforehand. However, they will help lay down the foundations for you to have a strong, safe and sustainable recovery to get back into a regular exercise routine.

1. Pelvic floor strengthening

Even if you didn't have a vaginal birth, a growing baby places a lot of stress on the core and pelvic floor muscles so postpartum pelvic floor strengthening is super important. If you are experiencing bladder leakage there are a number of things that can be done to help, so don't suffer in silence!

Kegels exercises can be practiced any time any where - even while sitting at the traffic lights in your car! Breathe in even inhales and exhales. Visualise a hammock of muscles extending from the front of the pubic bone towards the back. On the inhale allow the muscles to relax, on the exhale, draw the 'hammock' up and in.

This is not just about Kegels though, as your core muscles go from your thighs right up to your rib cage, so strengthening and stabilising core work is important too. It's a good idea to book in with a physiotherapist well-versed in women's postpartum recovery. Following a gentle postpartum core-strengthening programme (an intense or mainstream one may make the issue worse) preferably under the guidance of a knowledgeable personal trainer, pilates or yoga teacher can also be a good place to start.

2. Stretch out (but not too much!)

With your new repertoire of repetitive tasks bending down to pick up baby out of the bassinet or cot, getting up and down off the floor, holding baby for extended periods of time, and sitting down to bottle or breastfeed frequently, it's easy for muscles to feel stiff and your posture and lower back to suffer.

Take some time each day to do some gentle stretches or yoga - especially to open up through the chest and lengthen the spine. The yoga poses Gomukhasana, Jathara Parivartanasana and Svasana are great ones to practice. Anything with your arms in a cactus/goalpost position elbows level with shoulders will help stretch the chest.

You may have already heard of relaxin - a special hormone that goes into super-production to loosen your joints and ligaments in preparation for childbirth. Relaxin is always present in our body, but what's often not discussed is that it's still in your system enough to affect your joints and ligaments up to six months AFTER MILK PRODUCTION STOPS. Bear this in mind and don't try to overstretch. Always keep a soft bend in your joints (elbows and knees especially) to keep them safe.

3. Take a walk

Walking is low impact, gets you out of the house, it's free, it gets your heart pumping and lungs going, and if you have a baby carrier or stroller you can take baby with you! Find different places to walk so you get a change of scenery - it could be by the beach, at the zoo, in a park, with other mamas or with your family. Start off with shorter distances and gradually build on them, if you're lucky it may even help baby drift off to sleep.

4. Dance to the music

Put on your favourite music in the lounge or outside in the yard and get dancing! Babies typically love experiencing this kind of movement with you while they're in a carrier so it's a great opportunity to bond with them and get your exercise in at the same time.

5. Reconnect with your core

Learning or re-learning how to activate your core muscles can take time and patience; because of everything that's happened in that area of your body as baby grew, those muscles need to be trained to switch on again.

A great place to start here is to gently begin to connect breath with movement. Yoga cat/cow is perfect for this. You can do the spinal movement lying down on the floor, you can do it seated against the wall, or you can go on all fours.

Once you have your base position take full deep even breaths, inhale to gently arch your back and feel your pelvis tilt forward, then reverse this exhaling to draw your ribcage and navel down to your spine as your tailbone curls under. Start off with very small movements first and gradually make them a little bigger. Aim for 5 rounds of breath.

6. Get outdoors

It can be easy to get in a rut and stay indoors most of the time when you have a little one, but there's so much about getting outdoors that is good for you. Fresh air to fill your lungs, sunshine to help your body synthesise Vitamin D which is important for both physical and mental health. And as messed up as your sleeping times may be, outdoor exposure of your eyes to natural light will help keep your Circadian rhythm (the internal body clock that regulates your sleep/wake cycles) as normal as possible.

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