Show Notes:
IPregnancy comes with enough questions—figuring out how to move your body safely shouldn’t be one of them. We’re joined by Megan Martineau, a NASM-certified personal trainer who specializes in pre and postnatal fitness. She breaks down what safe movement really looks like during pregnancy—and spoiler alert: it’s not as scary or restrictive as a lot of us have been led to believe.
We talk about all the confusing (and often conflicting) advice out there and how overwhelming it can be, especially for first-time moms. Megan reassures us that most exercises are safe as long as you’ve been cleared by your provider—basically, skip the extreme sports and direct hits to the abdomen, but otherwise, you’re good to move. She shares why form, posture, and breathing (like 360-degree breathing) are key, and how to ease into strength and cardio workouts at any fitness level.
Whether you were active before pregnancy or are just starting out, Megan offers practical tips to help you feel strong, supported, and confident in your body. We also touch on the importance of tuning out social media noise and finding trusted advice that actually makes you feel empowered—not scared.
If you’ve ever wondered, “Is this safe?” or “Where do I even begin?”—this one’s for you.
Top Three Things You Will Learn In This Episode:
- What types of exercise are actually safe during pregnancy—including which ones to avoid and how to know when you’re overdoing it.
- Why breathing techniques, posture, and good form matter more than intensity, especially as your body changes throughout pregnancy.
- How to start (or maintain) a fitness routine during pregnancy, even if you weren’t active before—plus how to filter out the noise and find advice you can trust.
Episode Notes and Resources:
Megan Martineau’s Website: https://www.vibrantmamawellness.com
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HER Circle – https://www.herhealthcollective.com/membership
Transcript:
Cindi
We’re so honored to be chatting with Megan Martineau, the force behind the business, Vibrant Mama Wellness. Megan is a NASM certified personal trainer with multiple certifications in pre and postnatal fitness, and she’s on a mission to help moms feel strong, confident and supported through all stages of motherhood, her approach is all about functional fitness movement that actually makes sense for your real life, whether you’re trying to conceive, you’re pregnant or navigating postpartum. Megan meets you exactly where you are with workouts that are effective, sustainable, and most importantly, they feel good today with Megan, we’re diving into staying active and strong during pregnancy. What’s safe, what’s helpful, and how to tune into your body when things don’t go exactly as planned. Hello to nausea and exhaustion. Megan is breaking it all down in a way that’s approachable, empowering and real. Hi, Megan. We’re so happy to have you here.
Megan Martineau
Hi, thanks so much for having me. I’m happy to be here.
Cindi
Great. Well, we’re gonna dive right in with our first question and learn all about staying active and strong during pregnancy.
Crissy
Okay, let’s start with the basics. I think there’s so much noise around this topic that it can feel overwhelming. And you know, you find out you’re pregnant, and you’ve heard this and this and this, and all of a sudden there’s just a lot of fear around that with that lack of knowledge. So what kinds of exercises or workouts are considered safe during pregnancy? Are there any general do’s and don’ts people should keep in mind?
Megan Martineau
yeah, so the good news is, as long as you have been cleared by your provider to exercise during pregnancy, it is perfectly safe to do so there’s really not a whole lot that is off limits, besides, like extreme sports, you know, which I feel like the majority of people aren’t really doing anyways, or things that are going to cause a direct blow to the abdomen, which kind of goes hand in hand with, like the extreme sports kind of thing. You know, you’re not going to skydive, do things that are intense, like that, but for like the general population, people that are just trying to work out, go to the gym, stay active, almost every exercise can be pregnancy safe. It really depends on the person, and it depends on how you’re doing them. So I feel like that’s great news for a lot of people, because it can be really nerve wracking, especially with, you know, our culture of social media and just seeing all these different things. You have influencers, you have fitness professionals like just regular moms, so many people giving advice that you’re like, What do I do? Like, what’s legit? But the good news is, almost everything can be safe. Just depends on you, how you’re doing, the exercises, breathing techniques are going to be really important. That’s something that I work with people a lot on is breathing and form, so making sure that you’re using good form with your exercises, I would say, in terms of, like, general things that were like, yeah, maybe don’t do that. Sit ups in your third trimester. Most people can’t do that anyways, because of the big belly or something like a plank, because that can put a lot of pressure on the core, which we’re trying to avoid, because that can lead to things like worsening abdominal separation or some pelvic floor issues. So that’s really the only things that I would say, like try to avoid, but pretty much, you’re good to go.
Crissy
I love that the messaging around exercise during pregnancy has become more like this. It felt much more fearful when I was pregnant with my daughter, eight, eightish years ago now. I don’t know I was trying to do the math in my head. I feel like there’s much more of this idea of if you have been active up to this point, continue doing what you’re doing, listen to your body, seek out the advice of a professional, but you don’t have to stop moving your body in the ways that you love. So I think that’s a really powerful message, and I love what you shared around. It’s wonderful to have access to things through things like social media, but it can also be overwhelming, especially if you’re pulling from a bunch of different sources. So I think it’s important to find one or two sources that you know you can trust, and just hone in on them ask your questions there. And I think that’s a really powerful message, too.
Cindi
Megan, I’m really curious to know we’ve talked about starting with the basics and kind of exercises that we can do while we’re pregnant, and that sounds like there’s really not a lot of restriction, unless you’re a woman’s rugby player and you probably don’t want to go out there and do that. But what if somebody wasn’t super active before they got pregnant? Pregnant, is it okay to start a workout routine during pregnancy? And if it is okay, where do they start?
Megan Martineau
Yes. So again, and I always just make sure this is so clear to people, like, as long as you’ve been cleared by your doctor to work out like that is an important first step. Make sure your doctor has cleared you, because there are conditions in pregnancy where it’s not safe to work out, like if you have placenta previa, which is where your placenta is covering your cervix, that usually means you’re on pelvic rest and exercise is not safe for you. So for sure, start with checking with your provider making sure you’re cleared to work out. If they say yes, you’re cleared to work out, ACOG recommends 150 minutes of moderately intense exercise a week, so that ends up being around like 20 minutes a day. So that means you should be getting your heart rate up and sweating. Doesn’t mean you’re going to be doing like an intense HIIT workout, especially if you’re not used to that and you haven’t been working out, but that kind of means like you’re working hard enough where you know you’re breathing a little heavier, but you can still maintain a conversation with somebody you know you’re not gasping for air. But generally, what I recommend for people, if you’re brand new to exercise, you’re starting during pregnancy. First of all, that’s great. That’s, you know, not an easy thing to do. Pregnancy is hard, like we were talking about before, the nausea and exhaustion. So like, give yourself a pat on the back for starting. That’s a big step, and I usually recommend starting out with body weight exercises. And like I mentioned before, really focusing on breathing techniques. So it’s something we call 360 breathing. And this is where you’re really focusing on getting good deep breaths and allowing your rib cage to literally expand 360 degrees. So that’s to the front the side and the back on your inhale breath, also called diaphragmatic breathing, which is something people are familiar with, but we’re really wanting to get movement in that rib cage, getting good deep breaths, because a lot of us breathe really shallowly, like up in the upper chest. So we want to work on coordinating that diaphragm with the pelvic floor, getting good deep breaths. Great place to start, literally, if that’s all you did in your pregnancy, is just work on 360 breathing. That’s incredible and has so many benefits for birth and even postpartum recovery. If you want to go beyond breathing, body weight exercises is a great place to start making sure you have good form, because we have a lot of postural changes that happen during pregnancy as the belly is growing a lot of times, rounded shoulders as we’re trying to compensate for that weight in the front. So really focusing on posture, trying to have your rib cage stacked over your pelvis, thinking about not tucking your pelvis under or sticking it out. Those are two things that people tend to do during pregnancy. And then as you start to get good with body weight exercises, your form is great. You’re incorporating that breathing, then you can start to add on more weights, because it is safe to lift weights in pregnancy. That’s a myth that, like, you shouldn’t lift over, you know, 25 pounds or whatever. But we want to start slowly. You also don’t want to come right out the gate, you know, dead lifting 50 pounds, if you’re not used to that. So we would want to slowly work up as you build strength. And we also want to be thinking about hip mobility, because that’s going to be really important for birth. And just like stretching in general, but really focusing on the hip mobility, because we want to have good internal and external rotation of our legs, that’s going to be really key for birth and pushing specifically. So those are some areas that I typically recommend people start with. And even if you’re not used to strength training, like things like yoga are great. I feel like a lot of people think about prenatal yoga, Pilates is generally good too. Just making sure that you know if you’re going to a Pilates class, making sure that they are in some way trained in prenatal fitness, because there are, like, certain considerations, but those are great activities too. Walking. Always love walking.
Cindi
Well, that’s great that you mentioned all of that because I was curious about if someone wasn’t doing the cardio activity, if the weight lifting was going to be enough, but you just said that the cardio was important to get in there, walking, but not starting, obviously, with running when you’re pregnant if you haven’t been running previously,
Megan Martineau
Yeah, and if you were a runner before pregnancy, it is safe to continue running. I know sometimes people are nervous about that. But also, just being considerate of your pelvic floor, running can be hard on the pelvic floor, as the belly is growing, we have more pressure. So just taking note of like, do you start to notice you have more leaking, you know, or pelvic pressure, things like that. Basically, we want to start slow and slowly build our capacity as we get stronger. You don’t want to just like, Go hard right out of the gate. Because, I mean, really, we don’t ever want to do that, because that usually never ends well for anybody. So just slow and steady is always a good course of action.
Crissy
It always wins the race, right?
Megan Martineau
Yes, exactly.
Cindi
Well, Megan, thank you so much. It’s been a joy to have you here, and we always love connecting with you.
Megan Martineau
Thank you so much for having me. This was fun!
