CEC
ARTICLE
1 OF 5
ARTICLES
MIND THE GAP
REDUCING ABDOMINAL
SEPARATION SEVERAL YEARS
POST-CHILDBIRTH
Women’s health expert Dianne Edmonds looks at the case of a personal trainer who discovered
her own abdominal separation nine years after giving birth, and proceeded to reduce it by
rebuilding her deeper core.
bdominal
separation
–
or
diastasis recti – is common in
pregnant and post-natal women,
with up to two-thirds displaying
separation of some degree. The condition is
defined by a separation of the connective
tissue (linea alba) joining the two strips of
muscles (rectus abdominis) down the middle
of the abdomen. It occurs when the
abdominal wall muscles and their connective
tissue attachments stretch due to a
combination of abdominal weakness,
hormonal changes, weight gain and
abdominal wall stretch caused by the
growing foetus.
A
Case study 1: The 9 years post-natal
PT
Amber is a personal trainer who had twins
9 years ago. Until she attended a practical
professional development course on
training postnatal clients, she had no idea
that she herself had an abdominal separation
remaining as a result of her pregnancy. She
discovered that she had a 3-finger-width
separation above and at her umbilicus (belly
button) level, and the gap felt like quite a dip
in between her rectus abdominis muscles.
Amber had noticed ‘doming’ in her
abdominal wall while performing certain
exercises during CrossFit training, but had
not been aware of what the gap was. During
the post-natal client training course, she
learnt what an abdominal gap was, how to
check for its presence in female clients, and
what exercises to implement with clients
who exhibited the condition to help train
their changed abdominal wall.
For her, the big revelation was learning
how the pelvic floor is wired together with
the lower abdominal muscles, and although
she had worked transversus abdominis
before, she hadn’t felt the link working with
her pelvic floor. This changed the pattern of
recruitment she was using and, over time,
she felt her gap reduce as she increased
THE QUICK READ
• Abdominal separation – or diastasis
recti – occurs to varying degrees in up
to two-thirds of pregnant and post-
natal women
• Some women will not realise they have
the condition until a considerable time
after they have given birth, with some
discovering only several years later
• By learning how to modify training, and
remove exercises that put excessive
tension on the abdominal wall and
cause ‘doming’, trainers can help
clients reduce their abdominal gap and
safely strengthen their pelvic floor
• Many personal trainers will not have
the knowledge to screen clients for
diastasis recti and to program their
training accordingly.
NETWORK SUMMER 2019 | 47