Breathing Space for New Mothers: Rest, Stretch, and Smile--One Yoga Minute at a Time

Description

A humorous and gentle approach to becoming a new mom, with space to breathe, do yoga, and be "good enough," even if it's only through a one-minute yoga pose at a time. In twelve humorous, practical, and compassion-filled chapters, yoga instructor Alison Rogers and co-author Erin White forge a new path through contemporary motherhood with their collection of gentle and generous suggestions for beginning and deepening a home yoga practice for new mothers; their treasury of authentic and honest stories of motherhood; and their original tools and metrics to synthesize their key messages. Organized around the first year of a baby's life and focusing on the keystones of a yoga class--but taking only one minute from a busy mom's schedule for a given exercise--readers go from a warm-up through the art of balancing and building core strength to the deep and rejuvenating rest of savasana, chapter by chapter. Through the sometimes awkwardly funny stories and "we've been there too" insights, the authors offer mothers a singular message- Your wellbeing matters as much as your baby's. Each chapter ends with a one-minute yoga pose, which can be done in a sequence (listed at the end of the book), to create a relaxing and balancing support for the incredibly demanding first year with a baby and to help mothers know that they are "good enough."

Yoga instructor and creator of the Yoga for Parenting workshops, ALISON ROGERS, and co-author Erin White have a combined 5 kids and over 20 years of "good enough" mother experience. Rogers trained as a Kripalu Yoga instructor at Kripalu Center for Yoga and earned a masters degree in counseling psychology from Harvard and a doctoral degree in Cross-Cultural Child Development from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. After more than thirty years of clinical work as a therapist and educator, she shifted her focus to create The Yoga of Parenting workshops, a practice and philosophy that integrates principles from cutting edge western psychology with mindful yoga to help parents as they practice caring for their children with confidence, authenticity, and pleasure. ERIN WHITE received her MFA in fiction writing from the University of Massachusetts. She is the author of Given Up for You- A Memoir of Love, Belonging, and Belief (University of Wisconsin Press, 2018). Her work has appeared in The New York Times, Creative Nonfiction, the Kenyon Review, and elsewhere, including several anthologies- The Bitch is Back, the sequel to The Bitch in the House (ed. Cathi Hanauer, William Morrow, 2016); Use Your Words- A Writing Guide for Mothers (ed. Kate Hopper, Viva Press, 2012) and Oh Baby, True Stories About Conception, Adoption, Surrogacy, Labor and Love (eds. Alice Bradley and Lee Gutkind, In Fact Press, 2015).

"If you've just given birth-for the first time or the eighth time-you can exhale now. Breathing Space for New Mothers is exactly what you need as you stumble into this messy, chaotic, beautiful, sleepless, joyful, and confusing time called motherhood. No judgments, no hard-and-fast prescriptions. Just compassionate wisdom and practical suggestions on how to truly care for yourself." -LINDA SPARROWE, author of Yoga Mama and Yoga At Home "This is a wonderful gift to any new mother. When we cultivate inner warmth, kindness, and health it not only helps us as mothers, but also helps everyone around us, including the new life we bring into the world. This book will help you care for your body with gentle yoga poses, and to relate to yourself with more wisdom and compassion so that your experience of motherhood is as fulfilling as possible." -DR. KRISTIN NEFF, author of Self-Compassion and The Mindful Self-Compassion Workbook "Breathing Space for New Mothers is not just a parenting guide, it's a life guide. It is about cultivating a quality of being that allows us access to our deepest wisdom and intuition as mothers." -HALA KHOURI, MA, cofounder and director, with Seane Corn and Susan Sterling, of Off the Mat Into the World and creator of the Radiant Pregnancy yoga video program "I'm so grateful to have mindfulness resources like Breathing Space for New Mothers to recommend to my patients. As a reproductive psychiatrist, I'malways looking for ways to support women in their body-mind emotions and remind us all about the healing power of breath." -ALEXANDRA SACKS, MD, reproductive psychiatrist and author of What No One Tells You: A Guide to Your Emotions from Pregnancy to Motherhood "Breathing Space for New Mothers offers new mothers a mental shift-one that creates more room to trust ourselves, look after ourselves, and be ourselves even as we settle into this new role. It's a slowing down for our racing minds and our wild expectations, and it is truly a gift." -KJ DELL'ANTONIA, author of How to Be a Happier Parent and former editor of the New York Times "Motherlode" blog