Most of the women experience some degree of abdominal separation (Diastasis Recti DR) and expansion of the abdominal wall in pregnancy because of the growing baby and it’s actually a really amazing function that allows your body to grow a full-term baby.
It can be difficult to assess yourself for diastasis during pregnancy, but you can certainly check your abdomen after pregnancy to see how your abdominal wall is healing. It’s recommended to wait until you’re about two weeks postpartum to do your first assessment.
It’s really important to note that the DR is about much more than just the separation of muscles. If you have a separation of your abdominal muscles, it can be just fine! Your core could be functioning well if your connective tissue is taut, strong, and can gain good tension when you need to use your core muscles.
Your abdomen has connective tissue that runs along the midline, from your sternum to pubic bone, called the linea alba. The linea alba softens and becomes more lax during pregnancy, which allows the abdominal wall to expand. When this happens, the span of the connective tissue widens, and the rectus abdominus muscle bellies (the right and left sides of this muscle group) move wider apart.
When you assess your diastasis you must keep this is mind and pay attention to the quality of the linea alba, that connective tissue along the midline of the belly. It’s also interesting to note the width of the gap and see how it changes over time. Just know that it might not change depending how long postpartum you are—and this can be absolutely OK.
Your core muscles don’t tear apart. They don’t rip apart. They’re still very much “together”, just wider apart compared to their pre-pregnancy position.
How Often Should I Assess?
If you’re using an exercise program to heal your diastasis recti, I recommend re-assessing every 2–3 weeks. This will typically give you good feedback as to whether your exercises are effective.
I recommend going through at least eight weeks of specific core exercises with very good consistency to get a good sense of the changes you feel in your abdominal wall.
Re-assess three to four times over that period and note the changes as you go along.
You’ll know when you have really great tension along your linea alba.
This means you’ll feel the strong tissue under your fingers when you press into your belly, when you do your core and floor connection breath. If you don’t feel good tension, you might feel this squishiness, or like you can press down easily into the belly.
Would you like to have a complimentary consultation and learn more about this? Please watch the video tutorial where I show how to assess your DR yourself on https://youtu.be/Fqnu220kDTg or simply fill my postnatal consultation form that can be found on my website sunnytrainer.com
