Hip Lab · Carrying · York · Sun 25 Oct

You're carrying a load you didn't have last year, for most of the day, and it gets heavier every fortnight. This is ninety minutes on how to hold it.

You might recognise

• Your back aches by the end of the day and your hips don't.
• You carry on the same side every time, and the other side feels useless.
• You rock them to sleep standing on one leg for forty minutes and only notice afterwards.
• Getting up off the floor with your baby in your arms is the worst bit of the day.

Nobody has looked at this

Postnatal advice covers the first six weeks and then stops. You get checked, you get signed off, and after that the carrying is just something you do. Nobody watches how you do it, and it's the single biggest physical demand in your week.

You've probably already tried stretching the bits that ache. It helps for an hour. It doesn't give the hip anything it can hold on to for the other twenty three.

What this is

A workshop, not a class and not a treatment. You'll be looked at, you'll be given things to do, and you'll leave able to do them without me.

We're working on the hips and the lower back specifically, because that's where the load of carrying goes.

What's actually happening

The ways of carrying that feel easiest are the ones that cost the least muscle. When you rest your baby on the front of your pelvis and push your hips forward, or park them out on one hip and stand on that leg, the ligaments around the joint hold you there instead of the muscles. That's efficient, which is exactly why a tired body finds it, and for a few minutes it's completely fine. It's the hours that add up, and it's nearly always more on one side than the other.

There's a second part to it that gets missed. Feeding puts your hip at ninety degrees for thirty to sixty minutes at a time, several times a day, which shortens the front of the hip in the same way a desk does. When the front of the hip won't lengthen and won't work, your pelvis slides forward in front of your feet to produce the extension the hip can't supply. So the way you stand is partly a fatigue habit and partly what a short, under-strong hip does when it's asked to stand still holding something.

The numbers, if you like numbers

A full-term baby weighs around 3.3kg and gains 150 to 200g a week for the first three months. That's an increase of roughly five per cent a week. Birth weight doubles by four or five months and triples by twelve, so you go from carrying about 3.3kg to carrying about 10kg inside a year.

For comparison, the American College of Sports Medicine's guidance for adding weight in the gym is a two to ten per cent increase, and only once you can already manage a couple of extra repetitions for two sessions running. So the rate is inside what's recommended. What's missing is everything the recommendation depends on. There are no rest days. There's no option to hold the weight where it is for a fortnight while your body catches up. It isn't three sets twice a week, it's several hours a day. And it started the week you gave birth, with no build-up.

Nobody would design that programme. Every one of us is on it.

How the session runs

• We take a baseline. You hold a weight the way you'd hold your baby, and I tell you what I can see: where your weight sits across your feet, where your ribs are relative to your hips, which side the load lives on. Then a single-leg test for how level your pelvis stays. You'll find out which side is your strong one, and it's usually the opposite of what people expect.
• We build the strength that holds the position. The side of the hip that keeps your pelvis level under a load, and the glutes that keep you standing over your feet instead of hanging off the front.
• We unload what's been held in one shape. The front of the hip and the flank, which take the brunt of feeding and then pay for it when you stand up.
• We work on the carry itself. Three ways of holding your baby that all work, taught as a skill, so the one you default to gets a share of the day instead of all of it.
• We re-take the baseline, and you leave with a sixty-second reset you can do while the kettle boils, plus a longer version for the days you get one.

A small room

Places are limited, because I'm looking at how each person stands rather than talking at a room. If I can't see you, the session doesn't do what it's for.

What you're working on

• The muscle on the side of your hip that levels your pelvis, so standing and rocking on one leg stops being the only way to settle them.
• Hip extension you produce with muscle rather than by pushing your pelvis forward, so your lower back stops paying for the way you stand.
• Length and strength at the front of the hip, so getting up out of the feeding chair doesn't take a moment to sort itself out.
• A single-leg stand you can trust, so stairs with them on board stop being the bit you brace for.
• Three carrying positions instead of one, so your strong side stops doing all of it.

Questions people ask

How soon after giving birth can I come?

From six weeks after a vaginal birth, once you've had your GP check. From ten weeks after a caesarean. There are four questions on the booking form so I know what to adapt, and if you're not there yet I'll tell you straight rather than take your money.

Can I bring my baby?

No, and I know that's the harder answer. There's floor work and single-leg balance work in this session that needs both your hands and your full attention, and neither survives a room with babies in it. If cover is the thing standing between you and coming, say so to whoever organised this. A shared sitter for the ninety minutes, or a slot when partners are home, is how other groups have solved it.

I'm not fit and I haven't exercised since before I was pregnant.

That's who this is for. Nothing here needs a base level of fitness and every drill works at half the reps. Say so on the form and I'll keep an eye on you.

I barely slept last night.

Come anyway and do less. That's a normal state in this room rather than a reason to stay home.

Is this pelvic floor recovery?

No, and see below.

Why we built it

Holly and I have taught and practised yoga and pilates for years. We were in shape, and everyone else thought we were in shape too. Then we had a baby, and the strain of the carrying was so constant that being in shape turned out not to cover it.

We were lucky enough to spot what was happening, and to know that the way a body adapts to carrying can be modified rather than lived with. So we built this workshop for us, and for you.

What ninety minutes won't do

It won't undo the last however many months, and it isn't pelvic floor care. If you're leaking, or something feels heavy or dragging, or anything hurts across the front or the back of your pelvis, the person you need is a pelvic health physiotherapist. That's worth doing even if you've been told it's normal, and I'll tell you what to look for. I'd rather send you to the right person than sell you the wrong hour.

The details

When: Sunday 25 October, 1pm

Where: St James the Deacon, Sherringham Drive, Woodthorpe, York YO24 2SE

Price: £22 per person

Bring: Comfortable clothes you can move in

Places: Adults only, so you'll need ninety minutes of cover

Run by Markus. Built with Holly, who leads the pre and postnatal work at The Human Lab.

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