The third trimester is about balancing your changing body and working through any aches and pains. The end of your pregnancy is likely a mix of excitement and fatigue from carrying extra weight. Your nesting instincts may kick in as your body reshapes itself, creating space for the growing life inside.
Discomfort from the transformation serves as a building block for strength, balance and resilience that you’ll soon need to care for a newborn. Your posture and intentional movement can help you embrace this time and transform back pain in pregnancy into a source of power.
How Common Is Back Pain in Pregnancy?
It can be helpful to know that so many other women experience back pain in pregnancy. In 2023, an analysis of 28 studies involving more than 12,900 women estimated that approximately 40.5% of women experience back pain during pregnancy. The rate is higher when separated by trimester, with only 36.8% of women in the second trimester and 47.8% in the third trimester.
Tips for Turning Pain into Strength During the Third Trimester
If you’re experiencing back pain during pregnancy, it’s common and normal. You can seek solutions that strengthen your body in the long term.
1. Prepare With Posture
As your center of gravity shifts toward the front, your lumbar curve deepens, your shoulders roll to the back, your hips tilt to the front and your pelvis rocks toward the back. The resulting symptoms may be painful. These changes are a natural way for your body to acquire space and protect the life it carries.
During pregnancy, your posture changes in both strong and weak muscles, especially the abdominals and hip stabilizers. Without correction, the changes continue into the postpartum period. Talk to your healthcare provider about daily movements that engage your pelvic floor to improve mobility. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists recommends that patients check their posture regularly to reduce chronic lower back strain.
2. Manage With Mechanics
Weight gain, hormonal changes, and looser ligaments in joints and hips typically cause back pain during pregnancy. The most common location for pain is at or around the sacroiliac joints of the pelvis and sacrum, as well as the lower back.
Maintaining good posture and engaging in regular exercise can help alleviate back pain. Wear low-heeled shoes and consider a maternity belt for support. Standing with both feet on the floor, sitting with a small pillow behind the lower back, and walking for 10 to 15 minutes daily can help reduce spinal stress.
3. Adapt With Hormones
Two unsung heroes of late pregnancy are relaxin and progesterone. They cause your ligaments and joints to relax to ease delivery, but this can result in some instability in your lower back and hips. Although this can cause discomfort, it also allows for more flexibility during birth and recovery.
Medical professionals have suggested that both stretching and low-impact exercise can relieve pain and prevent abdominal separation, which can weaken the abdominal muscles and prevent them from effectively supporting the back.
During the third trimester, relaxin levels reach their peak, which can affect mobility. Prenatal yoga, swimming and pelvic exercises can maintain that flexibility for labor while keeping joints stable. Hormonal shifts are a natural part of the body’s preparation during pregnancy.
4. Strengthen With Core Awareness
Your muscular core is essential while your abdominal wall is stretching. The transverse abdominis, multifidus and pelvic floor will all help provide stability during the pregnancy. Being more mindful of your breath and slow, controlled movements will also relieve extra pressure in the lower back and hips.
Prenatal specialists can guide you through safe and gentle techniques. The goal is to maintain spine alignment and prevent overexertion. By easing tension and circulating fluids, you support digestion and energize the body. Consistent effort can contribute to functional mobility and make daily activities easier.
5. Move With Intention
During the third trimester, women may want to nest and prepare their homes for the baby by organizing and deep cleaning. Bad posture while doing these types of tasks can cause pregnancy-related low back pain.
Some simple changes you can make include squatting before bending, taking 15-minute breaks and rotating your hips during standing. Even light nesting chores will become a mobility exercise. You’ll be stronger and better prepared for labor if you engage your muscles with intention. Turn nesting time into strength conditioning.
You’ll also gain physical and emotional advantages from movement. The Mayo Clinic suggests that activities such as stretching and taking short walks can improve sleep quality and reduce anxiety in the third trimester. You’ll increase blood flow and reduce inflammation, which will aid in labor and postpartum recovery.
6. Recover With Realignment
The deepened lumbar curve in late pregnancy may cause backaches even without activity. Engaging in safe, gentle “reverse” postures, such as the child’s pose, side stretches and a supported bridge pose, can reset your spine and provide relief. Some experts recommend using warm compresses, massage, and alternating ice and heat therapy. Always consult your OB/GYN before adding any regimen to ensure it is safe for you and your baby.
Incorporate warm water exercises with gentle stretching to alleviate muscle stiffness and improve mobility. A licensed prenatal massage therapist will know which movements are safe for each stage of your pregnancy.
7. Endure With Resilience
The third-trimester paradox reveals that the ligaments, muscles and joints that cause you discomfort now will actually help you during labor. The physical and emotional strength built within the process will benefit you long after your baby is born. Mindful movement, fostered through body awareness and supported by professional resources, enables you to transform discomfort into strength. This process prepares you for an easier postpartum recovery and the ongoing resilience you’ll need to feed a newborn every few hours.
Gaining Strength Through Small Modifications
Aligning your posture and participating in approved, gentle exercises can help you prepare for a less stressful delivery and recovery. Identify your comfort zones and make the necessary adaptations, whether small or large, that will prepare your body for delivery and recovery. You’ll bounce back faster once the baby is here and have the stamina to keep up with the demanding schedule of new parenthood.
