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As a general guideline, modify yoga poses to accommodate the growing belly and choose variations that are gentler on the pregnant body. If you're unsure, focus on connecting with your baby by practising slow breathing rhythms and restorative poses during your class. Recommended poses include Child's Pose, Cat Pose, and Butterfly Pose.
Learn a simple, pregnancy-safe setup for Low Lunge (Anjaneyasana) to open the hips and lengthen the psoas. This small alignment shift creates more space for baby and supports a more comfortable, well-aligned body for birth.
Knowing that you are going to have a baby is a great joy. However, this joy is often accompanied by the discomforts of morning sickness, emotional ups and downs, and apprehension about the impending labour. Obstetricians and midwives recommend yoga to pregnant women to help promote a healthier, happier pregnancy. They notice that those women who have practised prenatal yoga throughout their pregnancy cope better with the challenges of labour.
At Yogababy, we honour the fourth trimester as a sacred transition — a time of deep physical recovery, emotional recalibration, and bonding with your newborn. Your body has carried and birthed your baby with incredible strength. Now it needs softness, care, and simple practices that help you feel supported from the inside out.
Movies often focus on one dramatic moment in labour — the announcement that someone is “10 centimetres dilated!” But in reality, there’s another equally important part of the story: the baby’s station. In the Couples Active Birth Workshop with Suzanne Swan, you’ll learn how to use knowledge like this to make informed, confident decisions during labour. Together, you’ll explore how to ask the right questions in the birthing space
Research consistently shows that when someone feels involved in their birth decisions, they’re more likely to view their experience positively — regardless of how it unfolds. It’s not about achieving a “perfect” birth; it’s about feeling supported, respected, and part of the process.
Even with preparation, labour can be unpredictable. A Couples Active Birth Workshop equips partners to stay flexible, communicate effectively, and assist in decision-making if things don’t go exactly as planned.
Feeling confident and calm during birth starts with understanding your options and knowing how to support your body and mind through the process.
The last thing you want to do while you’re pushing your baby out is create extra tension in your pelvic floor.
One of the simplest yet most effective strategies for birth is learning to intentionally relax during the pauses between contractions. These brief rests are the body’s natural way of helping a birthing person reset and conserve energy.
Your birth is one special day — but your postpartum lasts for months and beyond.
Join a Yogababy Pregnancy Yoga course to prepare for both — your birth and the beautiful community that can carry you through the weeks after.
When labour intensifies, many women instinctively hold their breath or tense up. But sound can be a powerful tool.
Whether you birth vaginally, by cesarean, naturally, or with interventions, the practices of yoga are always there to support you. Prenatal yoga isn’t about how you give birth—it’s about how you feel as you move through it.
That’s the gift of prenatal yoga—it isn’t only about physical postures. It’s about preparing your mind, nervous system, and spirit for birth, however it unfolds.
When we think about preparing for birth, it’s easy to picture movements, stretches, and postures. But one of the most powerful tools we have isn’t physical at all—it’s our breath.
Ash’s birth story is a powerful reminder that preparation and practice can transform labour. With the help of the Pregnancy Yoga and Active Birth workshop, she had a two-hour active labour, a water birth with no pain relief, and even lifted her daughter out of the water herself.
An Active Birth is one in which the woman gives birth in the best possible, uniquely individual way, for her at that particular moment in her life. She can focus her mind in a relaxed and confident way to engage in the process of birth, creating for herself an altered state of consciousness that will ensure the safest possible birth for her and her baby.
Planning your yoga teacher teaching for next year? Maybe you'd like to skill up on teaching pregnant women. Suzanne Swan with be offering a 90-150hr training in Pregnancy, Active Birth and Baby yoga from June, 2022.
Create a trance-like state where the reality of stress and pain does not reach you. Your aim is to become one with your body, where you are your breath, you are your womb, and no longer head or mind. Ie. visualise waves flowing in and flowing out, breathe in rhythm with the waves.
From 34 weeks onwards, your own postural awareness and habits can potentially encourage your baby to lie with his or her back to your left front/side so that the baby's head engages in the pelvic brim in this position. This will increase the potential for normal and straightforward birth.
This is Sammy and he came to Mums and Bubs yoga from 12 weeks. We all know that yoga is amazing for adults, and postpartum for mothers, but did you know there are many benefits for your baby as well? Babies benefit from movements that strengthen and stretch their muscles, relieving them of tension and increasing relaxation. The benefits of relaxation are well known, ranging from improved sleep, to better digestion.
"Attending pregnancy yoga classes helps women come together to explore and celebrate the joys and challenges of this precious time in their lives, in a safe and comfortable environment," says yogababy teacher, Suzanne Swan. "Women find a lot of comfort in each other’s encouragement and many friendships are formed at class".
My biggest driver for having a natural birth was to improve my chances of breast feeding and I’m pleased to say our little Oscar is thriving, putting on a kilogram in his first month of life with exclusive breastfeeding. It was such a challenging time but you helped us be as prepared as possible. We can’t thank you enough!
Like birth, yoga involves an intricate dance between control and surrender. In the Active Birth workshops, you will work in a gentle and specific way, learning to move the body and access deeper levels of relaxation and release.
Thank you for helping us achieve a positive & empowering birth. Without attending the Calm birth course & going to your Active Birth yoga classes, our experience may not have been the same. My husband & I can honestly say we felt so prepared & ready, which gave us the beautiful & calm birth that we’d hoped for.
This birth taught me of the power and infinite wisdom within me and my body. Being at home, trusting my body to go into labour when it was ready and birthing my placenta naturally was healing and affirming.
I laboured at home using many of the techniques you took us through during our active birth session. Vocalisation, visualisation and movement (resting in between contractions) were all helpful and Kieran was able to actively be involved using the acupressure points, hip release, prompting my breathing as well as using soft-touch during rest phases. All in all, I loved my birth experience and found the session we did with you to be most empowering and incredibly useful, so thank you!
While an active birth involves the freedom to move and use upright positions, it is more than just positioning. “An active birth is one in which the birthing mother is in charge of her choices and decisions, thus enabling her to enjoy a productive and mutually respectful partnership with her birth attendants” (Janet Balaskas).
With this in mind any birth, whether natural or assisted, may be called an active birth.