• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
Pregnancy Logo 2018

Pregnancy Magazine

Pregnancy and infancy news, tips, and reviews

“Great
  • Pregnancy
  • Labor & Delivery
  • Baby
  • Breastfeeding
  • Buyer’s Guide
  • mom

How to develop a winning mindset during pregnancy and beyond: science backed strategies for when you feel like giving up

by Isa Herrera, MSPT CSCS Leave a Comment

kegel exercises during pregnancy
Training your brain filters to see the bright side is within your reach

By Isa Herrera, MSPT, CSCS, founder of www.PelvicPainRelief.com
~~~


What if I told you that you’re a QUEEN?

Would you believe me? Would you wear your crown with pride and treat yourself with the respect, nurturing and love you’d think a queen feels every day?

Sometimes, when I tell a woman, “You are a QUEEN,” she laughs in my face. It happened many times. I probably would have laughed in the past too.

Yet over the years, I’ve seen powerful things happen and crazy wild dreams come true when, in that moment that seems like your darkest hour, when it feels like nothing will ever be OK again, you dare to keep a little bit of hope that there is a queen within you… and you dare to take the action you need to awaken her.

But how do you do start?

Start with your “why”

The first step to awakening the queen within you when everything just feels hard is to remember why it’s worth it to you to take another step forward.

You can create a list or a vision board or a Pinterest account – whatever works for you. But either way, focus on why all your effort matters:

Are you finding yourself overwhelmed with all of the pregnancy-related information out there? Are you tired of the looks you get from your spouse because they don’t get your lady problems, and expect things to go on as usual? Are you fed up with overworking yourself and feeling like you can’t function and you need to provide for your growing baby?

Is this overwhelm keeping you from doing something you love, like dancing, or starting a side hustle, because who has the energy or physical ability to pull any of that off?

Imagine what life could be like if you could pull that off.

Visualize what it could be like and how you would feel. Write it down or record it, then go back to it every single day, so your brain knows to focus on it more than on your pain of pelvic dysfunction. Specifically, you want the reticular activating system – or RAS – of your brain to learn what to focus on.

The RAS system is a filter for all of the information (subconsciously) flowing through our brain… It eliminates the extra noise. When a message gets past the RAS filter, it enters the brain and gets turned into thoughts, emotions or even both.

The more you consistently focus on what you’re working toward – virtually type it into your RAS every day by saying it out loud, writing it down or reviewing your list – the more that message will find its way past the RAS and your brain will be all in to help you claim and keep your crown.

Examine how you talk to yourself

If you consistently tell your RAS that you can’t do something – because of down there problems, because of exhaustion, because you’re a mom, because you’re not a mom, or because you’re too old or too young, or because you’re not good enough – that’s the message your RAS will pass on to your brain, and before you know it, it’ll become your reality.

When I was in the trenches, trying to heal my pelvic floor after my baby was born, I had to examine my thoughts every single hour of every single day. Because it was that hard to stay empowering toward myself.

A book that helped me was Loving What Is by Byron Katie. In the book, she recommends challenging thoughts you take for granted.

Ask yourself, “Is my thought true?” Are you really incapable? Do you really don’t have the time? Do you have 100% scientific evidence it will always be this way?

And if you think your thought is true, she recommends looking at how that makes you feel.

Then, she recommends turning the thought around, even just for a moment, long enough for you to tell yourself “I do have the time” or “I am capable,” and see how that feels.

Be willing to change the story you tell yourself

One of the reasons I had to examine how I spoke to myself every hour is because, when I was in the trenches of my healing journey, I had catastrophic thinking – something that’s very common for people dealing with chronic medical challenges.

Experts agree, and even brain research has shown, that if there is a negative pain or overwhelm mindset, focusing on how awful pain or overwhelm is and expecting it to worsen actually amplifies pain processing in the brain.

But when people suffering from long term pain receive cognitive behavioral therapy, it affects their pain levels. In one study, patients in a therapy group were asked to replace catastrophic’ patterns of thought – things like my pain is awful and there’s nothing I can do about it – with empowering thoughts, such as, this pain flare is temporary, or this overwhelm or pregnancy exhaustion is temporary, I’m going to focus on good self care, you can turn things around 100%.

In another recent study, for 11 weeks, a group practiced daily relaxation of mind and body [and] cultivated a sense of safety that counteracts the ingrained danger signals of chronic pain, stress and overwhelm that were previously sent to the brain, it reports.

They patients ended up with less pain, greater control over their experiences, less catastrophic thinking about pain and, importantly, increased volume in the regions of the brain associated with brain control,

They actually changed their brain’s structure.

And if you can do it with pain, you can do it with overwhelm during pregnancy, and you can do for negative self-perceptions. Start telling your brain how great and capable you are, and telling your unborn baby that everything is going to be ok, remind it of all the wonderful things you’ve already accomplished, and eventually, your RAS will let the message sink in.

Filed Under: Pregnancy

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Primary Sidebar

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Pinterest
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
Peaceful Discipline by Sarah Moore

More to See

parent coaching

Parent Coaching: 3 Ways to Create a More Joyful Home

By Sarah Moore

The perfect workout for pregnant women (sponsored)

By Isa Herrera, MSPT CSCS

how to be a good mother

How to Be a Good Mother: 5 Ways To Raise Children with Love & Respect

By Sarah Moore

Aligned Parents webinar

By Paul Banas

Footer

Copyright 2023 Pregnancy Magazine Group

Emails powered by Wishpond: PregnancyWishpond

Dedicated WordPress hosting: PregnancyFlywheel

WordPress Theme: PregnancyTheme

This website provides information of a general nature and is designed for educational purposes only. It is not a substitute for an examination by your healthcare provider. If you have any concerns about your own health or the health of your child, you should always consult with a physician or other healthcare professional. Please review the Terms of Use before using this site. Your use of the site indicates your agreement to be bound by the Terms of Use.

 

Recent

  • A Beginner’s Guide to Gentle Parenting: 5 Ways to Lead with Love
  • How to Be a Good Mother: 5 Ways To Raise Children with Love & Respect
  • Best Parenting Books: 28 Books That Will Change Your Life for the Better
  • Aligned Parents webinar
  • How to make sure your home is ready for the new addition to your family

Search

© Copyright 2023 Pregnancy Magazine Group · All Rights Reserved

This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish. Cookie settingsACCEPT
Privacy & Cookies Policy

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these cookies, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are as essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may have an effect on your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
SAVE & ACCEPT