Pregnancy Modified Squat Exercise

Commonly Used For: Pregnancy-Related Pain.

Video Transcription: I'm going to show you how to do a Modified Squat Exercise, which is a good way to do squats during pregnancy if doing the regular squats that I've demonstrated in my previous exercise videos are too difficult for you. So, what you're going to need is an exercise ball [here's a Swiss Ball via Amazon.com.], that you can get at any sporting goods store or online. You're going to put it up against the wall, turn around, put it so it fills in the small of your back there, lean into it a little bit. You want to make sure your feet are about hip distance apart and your toes are pointing straight forward. And then, you're just going to slowly squat down and come back up. You want your bottom to kind of follow the curve of the ball as you go down and up, just leaning back into the ball, letting it give you support, making this exercise a little bit easier during pregnancy. Down and up. If at any point you feel pain, cramping, contractions during this exercise, then you need to stop and contact your doctor. So, this is your Modified Squat Exercise.

Leg Exercise - Squats & Modified Squats

Commonly Used For: Knee pain and back pain.

Video Transcription: This is a squat exercise, which is a great functional exercise to get your quads and your glutes going. The way you want to do it is have something behind you just in case you tip over backwards, you'll sit instead of fall all the way over. You want to have your feet hip distance apart and you're slowly going to hinge at your hips and sit back. You want to make sure that you're sitting back towards the chair or surface that you're going towards and not coming forward so you don't want your knees going beyond your toes like that. Your knees should stay behind your toes as you come up and down. The other thing that you want to watch out for with your squats is your knee position — inward and outward. They should stay directly over your toes as you squat down. People have a tendency to let their knees come together. You don't want to let that happen. You want to make sure that they stay right over your toes as you squat up and down. If you have trouble maintaining that position, sometimes it's nice and can be a nice cue to use an exercise band. [You can buy these at sport goods stores or online at Amazon.com.] This one's a little bit long, but what you want to do is take that band and tie it around your legs. Again, feet are going to be hip distance apart so you should have a little pressure into the band now. And then maintaining that pressure out into the bands, now you're going to perform your squats and it just gives you a nice cue to help keep your knees out and not let them come inward. If performing regular squats is too easy for you and you want to make it a little bit more intense - especially up in your hip region, you can again use an exercise band. This one you do want to have a fairly long one. you're going to step on the band first. Make a cross in front of you. Go behind your legs, back cross. Then you're going to go around your thighs, cross gain. Hold it nice and tight and then you're going to do your squats, holding that apart. Just like that. So that's your modified squat.