09/05/2026
This advice usually comes from a place of protecting you from injury, not from any actual biological wall that stops muscle growth. Your body still responds to resistance training the same way it always has. Hormones like relaxin do loosen your joints a bit, which is why form and range of motion matter more, but that’s a reason to train smarter, not a reason to stop lifting.
A lot of my clients actually build noticeable strength in the second trimester, especially if they were undertrained going into pregnancy. The body adapts to the demand you give it, pregnant or not.
What actually derails progress isn’t the lifting itself. It’s fear-based advice that convinces women to stop everything, then spend the postpartum period trying to rebuild strength they didn’t have to lose in the first place.
Strength training during pregnancy, done with the right modifications, sets you up for an easier labor and a faster recovery.
