Seperated muscles

Mine separated the worst with my last three because they were so close and because I had a classical c-section (horizontal and vertical incision) with #6 there is still a two finger gap 15mths after my last birth.
It doesn't really bother me though I still have a reasonable flat tummy...my muscle aren't any where as good as they were and I don't think they ever will.

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Easily repaired is a lie. I had separated muscles with my third baby (my belly would go cone shaped when I lied down) and I did all the exercises and wore the compression belt. 2 years later they are no closer to being repaired than they were then. Ive given up on them ever being back to normal. My GP says that not every woman's muscles reconnect if they separated because of pregnancy, sometimes surgery is the only fix for them. But def try the exercises and compression band.

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Lol Freya, I used to say it looked like a football was coming out of my tummy (sideways!) when I did a sit-up kind of motion while laying down. My Ob told me that sometimes surgery is the only fix for it as well, but he said that private health insurance would never cover it, grrrr! Apparently it's classed as "elective" and for "cosmetic reasons". I wonder if private health insurance would cover it if you claimed that it was constantly causing pain and a dr recommended the surgery...?


Nikkie, if you want to see how big it is, lay on your back then pull your head and chest up off the bed like you are doing the start of a sit-up. While your tummy muscles are working run you fingers down the middle of your tummy from the middle of your rib cage down to your pelvis pushing in with a bit of pressure. Somewhere along the way you will feel a gap between the muscles. Imagine a guys six-pack has been split down the middle, because essentially that is what has happened to your muscles. Some people get the separation between rib cage and belly button (like me) and others get it between the belly button and pelvis (which I was told is usually more common). You can tell how big you split is by seeing how many fingers you can fit between the split sideways.

I was told that 1 in 3 pregnancies result in separated tummy muscles, so pretty common. My Ob also told me it's most common is pregnancies where the mother was fairly small to begin with, and then grew very quickly. So not surprising that it's happened to you with a tummy that has grown extremely quickly with two precious babes :)

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my muscle aren't any where as good as they were and I don't think they ever will.

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You'd think that after all the work our muscles do holding our babies in that we would have super muscles! Pity it doesn't seem to work that way lol

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Easily repaired is a lie. I had separated muscles with my third baby (my belly would go cone shaped when I lied down) and I did all the exercises and wore the compression belt. 2 years later they are no closer to being repaired than they were then. Ive given up on them ever being back to normal.

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Mine repaired extremely easily in just a month or two simply by wearing the tubi and doing the recommended exercises. The physio I saw didn't seem at all surprised about my quick recovery.

Clearly from the other posts here, that is not everyone's experience, but it was mine. It's extremely disrespectful to suggest that it's a "lie" for any of us to say that our repaired easily.

Mrs S - FX that you have a simple and quick recovery too, as it sounds like there's a vast variety of experiences (like every other element of pregnancy, labour and child rearing I guess :lol:)