I stumbled upon this recent publication in the Journal of the American Psychiatric Nurses Association and thought to share it with you all.
As you know all around the world women practice gentle and Hatha yoga classes during their pregnancy. In this article the authors aimed to explore the “real-world” experience of pregnant women with prenatal yoga. So, they put together 4 focus groups of currently pregnant or postpartum participants and ask them to describe in their own words why they sought yoga and what benefits they took from it.
The majority of participants sought group-class yoga to relieve the anxiety and depression during and post pregnancy. By practicing yoga regularly, they felt more connected to the changes occurred in their body throughout pregnancy. The authors concluded that “prenatal yoga may offer women a complementary health approach to self-manage their stress and depressive symptoms in a setting that promotes a sense of community.”