This may be hard to explain but I will try my best. I have been doing sit ups for quite a while now (just recenlty able to go all the way up) and I am not sore afterwards. It may burn while I'm doing them but afterwards or the day after nothing. Wonder why? That's how I thought you knew it was "working' I can feel them tightening, under all the flab of course. Also when I'm laying down my abs are apart and my stomach kidna sinks into it, and I can put my fingers in it, kind of gross actually. Hope I described that well to get a mental picture, lol. The sinkage (lol) has gotten better from the beginning but still there. I had a c-section, if that makes any difference. Anyone else have this?? What's the deal?
Hello! Good for you that your doing sit-ups! I'm too lazy and exhausted. Anyways, my stomach (I had a c-section too) kinda sinks in a little too. My stomach has come down tremendously, but still a little pouch there. Maybe its a little of the extra cushion that we had in there. Your stomach muscles are probably not used to anything and trying to get back how they once were, so they will not feel tight at first. Give it a few weeks and I bet you will feel a difference. Jen
Your stomach muscles can become seperated becoz of pregnancy I'm not sure if they can go back by themselves. I know someone who had a tummy tuck and they "sewed" her seperated muscle back together. Good for you for doing the situps though. amanda
I don't have an answer about the soreness question (often if you exercise regularly, though, you don't feel sore after a workout unless you do way more than usual). But you should be careful about doing regular sit ups if you have a big separation between your abs. Doing crunches or regular sit ups can actually make the separation worse. To get the muscles back together I've heard you can either hold them together (with your hands or a band around your stomach) when you do sit ups or (this is what I did) skip the sit ups for a while, and instead do exercises that involve sitting up straight in a chair or lying on your back and pulling in your stomach muscles as though you are trying to get your belly button to touch your spine. You can either do reps of that in and out motion or hold it in and pulse little tightening motions that pull in just a bit more. I did that, in the words of my OB "whenever you think of it," and my muscles came back together within four months.
This might help some: http://health.howstuffworks.com/how-diastasis-works3.htm It also gives some illustrations on some of the exercises for diastasis.
Good call on the sit-ups can be damaging post, I did not know that. Thanks for the website too. I'm going to start doing those exercises.
