Breathing With Ease: How Yoga Helps Relieve Rib Pressure and Acidity During Pregnancy

Nov 15 / Sol Alonso
During pregnancy, it’s common to feel your breath becoming shorter and the upper body tightening. As your baby grows, the uterus gently pushes upward into the diaphragm and rib cage.

The space that once felt open and expansive becomes smaller — creating pressure around the ribs, acidity, chest tightness and a feeling of breathlessness.These sensations are normal, but they can be deeply uncomfortable.

Yoga offers a way to soften them with awareness, movement and breath. This article will guide you through why these sensations happen and how gentle, mindful yoga can help you feel more spacious inside your changing body.

Why Rib Discomfort and Acidity Happen During Pregnancy

As pregnancy progresses, several physiological shifts create the perfect storm for rib and chest discomfort:

1. The diaphragm has less room to move
Your uterus lifts upward, reducing the space for the diaphragm — your main breathing muscle. This can lead to shallow breathing and tension in the upper body.

2. The rib cage expands and becomes more sensitive
Hormones like relaxin soften the connective tissues, allowing the ribs to widen. This expansion can feel tender or even painful.

3. The oesophagus is more exposed to reflux
With increased pressure on the stomach, acidity and heartburn become more frequent.

4. The upper body compensates with extra tension
To make room internally, the shoulders, neck and chest often tighten, creating a cycle of discomfort.

Understanding why these sensations happen helps you approach them with kindness instead of frustration — and shows why yoga can bring meaningful relief.

How Yoga Helps Create Space and Ease

Yoga doesn’t “fix” the anatomical shifts of pregnancy — but it helps your body adapt to them with more comfort, breath and mobility. Here’s how:

1. It restores mobility around the rib cage
Gentle lateral movements help release the intercostal muscles, reducing the feeling of being compressed.

2. It supports deeper, more satisfying breathing
With more freedom in the ribs, the diaphragm can soften and move more fluidly.

3. It reduces upper-body tension
Opening the chest and shoulders reduces the “guarding posture” that many women adopt during pregnancy.

4. It helps stabilise posture
When the upper body softens and lifts, the whole spine finds a more spacious alignment.

These changes may feel subtle at first — but together, they can transform your daily comfort.

A Somatic Exercise to Try at Home

The Rib Wave
  • Sit comfortably with your hands resting lightly on your rib cage.
  • Inhale through your nose and imagine the breath travelling outward into your ribs — not “up”, but “across”.
  • Exhale slowly through your mouth, letting your ribs soften and return inward.
  • Repeat for 8–10 breaths, exploring a smooth expansion in all directions: sideways, backward and gently forward.
This practice teaches your body that it can create space even when external room is limited.

Some Tips to Try

 Short sequence to open the rib cage

 How to make time for your prenatal yoga practice

Additional Tips

Try sleeping with your upper body slightly elevated
 This can help reduce acidity and make breathing easier.

Hydrate regularly
 Staying well-hydrated supports tissue elasticity and reduces general tension.

Practice “360° breathing” once a day
 Even one minute can reduce the feeling of pressure around the ribs.

Finding Space Within Change

Pregnancy invites you to explore your body as it shifts from day to day. Rib pressure and acidity are signs of expansion — physically, emotionally and metaphorically.
 
Through gentle yoga, you learn not only to create space in your chest, but also to inhabit your pregnancy with more ease, trust and breath.

You don’t need to push or force your way into comfort.
You can breathe your way into it.
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