How to Manage Abdominal Coning During Exercise
It is a huge priority to maintain exercise during pregnancy and return to it postpartum. It is not uncommon for perinatal athletes to experience diastasis recti during training, which will present as coning or doming along the midline of the abdominals. This is a normal physiologic change that happens with pregnancy - it does indicate that there is some thinning and stretching of the connective tissue (called the linea alba) between the two rectus abdominus muscles (6 pack muscles).
While there is still a lot to learn about diastasis, we do believe that it is beneficial to learn how to manage intra-abdominal pressure (IAP) appropriately. We use the coning as feedback from the body to let us know that there is an increase in IAP and that we can tap into the following tips to help increase the tension across the abdominals to decrease the coning.
Here is a video of what coning looks like in a postpartum patient:
You can see in the video that there is a protrusion along the midline of her abdominals. With some cueing, she is able to reduce the coning and control it. Ideally, that is what we are trying to achieve during exercise.
Here are 3 tools that are helpful in managing coning or doming during your workout:
Provide additional abdominal tension using external tools.
I love to use pilates balls, yoga blocks, resistance bands and sturdy walls to push or pull into while performing a movement. This external push gives your abdominals something to respond to. It automatically turns on the core increasing the amount of tension. You may see an immediate reduction of the coning.
An example would be in a plank or bear crawl position. If you see coning while performing, try placing a yoga block between the knees and squeeze inwards with the inner thigh muscles while you perform the plank or bear crawl hold. You should notice an improved recruitment of the lower abdominals, creating more tension.
Change up the position.
Sometimes scaling the position of the movement can make it easy enough to be able to control the doming. We want the abdominals to work hard, but if the position makes that too difficult, the coning may be harder to control.
A plank or push up is another great example. If you notice coning in the high plank position, taking it to an incline on a box or step can offload the exercise just enough.
Exhale and draw-in the abdominals on the harder phase of the movement.
Think “exhale on effort”. This is a helpful breath strategy to use during pregnancy and postpartum to easily manage pressure. Think about the phase of the movement that is more challenging - the pull of a deadlift or the push of an overhead press. Coordinating an exhale with a draw-in of the abdominals moments before you perform the more effortful phase will help decrease strain and therefore coning.
When I refer to a “draw-in”, think of hugging the baby close to you if you are pregnant. You should feel a wrapping of the deep abdominals to bring the abdominals in. Some other cues include “zipping up lower, middle and upper abdominals” or “drawing the front hip bones together”. With this contraction, you should immediately feel more tension being produced across the midline.
Check out this video from Instagram for some visuals of the tips above:
Again, our main goal is to keep our moms MOVING! Hopefully these tips can help improve understanding and awareness of abdominal coning, along with ways to help manage pressure. You know where to find me if you need any help along the way.
