The Miracle Ball Method for Pregnancy: Relieve Back Pain, Ease Labor, Reduce Stress, Regain a Flat Belly Paperback – Bargain Price, April 15, 2011

From 4 months on through the rest of my pregnancy I experienced excruciating sciatic nerve and back pain (partially due to pregnancy and partially due to a previous back injury). There was literally NO position and no piece of furniture in my house that I could get comfortable on... until I purchased the Miracle Ball. These balls work great!!! I primarily used them for the specific back pain but as I got bigger and neared the end of my pregnancy I explored other uses for the balls as well. The small manual/guide is nice because it gives lots of options and uses for the balls but isn't a huge honking book.I have been really happy with the balls and they are so small that I can slip them in my bag to take to work as well (great when I am sitting in my office chair all day... or at lunch if I want to do some back work on the floor of my office) or use them for long driving trips in the car.I also plan to use these in lieu of tennis balls as a massage option during labor. The tennis balls are just a little too firm for my comfort and my husband can be too aggressive... I will have him use these balls (or I can use them myself in the hospital bed) to help with back labor. Much better than the tennis balls, I think, because they are a bit larger and not rock hard. Again they are small, light and compact and fit easily in my labor and delivery bag.Also, I plan to use them after birth to help get back into shape or to alleviate pain whenever my old back injury flares up.

Great price! great miracle balls for muscle release. They give a little bit which is nice it helps the muscle relax! This pack was cheaper than the aqua miracle balls and I really like the purple color. My last set is still going strong but wanted another so I wouldn't have to go to otherside of house to get the set I use to relax my neck and back at bed time. I keep one in my car for tight muscles while driving. I tell everyone about these they are simply amazing!If you get a inflating needle these are easy to air up. (I do it about once a year)Down side they are vinyl. They off gas and will melt the finish off wood. I used to keep under my pillow by the head board until it ruined the finish. Large exercise balls do the same thing.I'm the organic/no chemicals type as much as possible but these work so well it's one place I tolerate some off gasing... I just set them on the carpeted floor or in a wicker basket so I am not breathing it in. For health and relaxing muscles I haven't found a better ball. I choose these over my foam rollers. These get into those tight areas and softly release without the hard foam rollers that hurts.

I ordered this and expected, as per the photo, to receive the 2 soft ‘miracle balls’ pictured in the advert. Wrong. What I received for $20 was a tiny booklet (used) on how to use the balls - but w/o balls!Very misleading photo of product

Around week 23, I started experiencing some bad lower back pain. I was in constant pain sitting down, standing up, walking around, and sleeping, I became pretty desperate. Yoga helped some, stretching helped some, trying to keep a better posture helped some, but nothing relieved the pain completely. After searching around, I found this book/ball combination and immediately after doing "Back on Ball" I felt much better. Resting on that ball felt better than any of my husband's massages. My prenatal masseuse won't even touch my lower back, only my shoulders, so this was the first 'relief' I've felt.The book you get is a small 4x4 inch book. There are lots of pictures, so the poses weren't hard to imitate. I wish they had come in DVD form, maybe with a routine so that I wouldn't have had to read while learning the poses, and it would do the timing/repetitions for me. The balls are around the same size, and are a squishy rubber texture, not unlike a mini exercise ball, but the material feels sturdy. The book is organized into 7 chapters - an intro chapter, breathing, ball poses, stretches that don't use the ball, pregnancy problems and which exercises to do for them, reshaping your body after birth, and postpartum exercises.The book seems to be geared more for people early on in their pregnancy or those trying to get pregnant to do to prevent these issues from occurring. I started late in my second trimester, but at least the lower back was helpful for me. The general thought behind them is that your body is clenched/tight and these balls in combination with breathing techniques will helped your body relax and let go.As grateful that I am for this book and the balls, I'm giving it a 4 star review as I don't really think this method is completely appropriate for some pregnant women. Most of the ball exercises require you to be on your back. They do provide alternate positions to use if being on your back is uncomfortable, but I found these alternate poses much less effective, some to the point of being useless, especially the one that worked best for me. I also have shoulder and neck pain from my chosen profession - a computer programmer where I am typing on a computer 9 hours a day - and I don't think the poses they listed for this problem were that helpful. I'm also pretty skeptical about the claim that this is good for reshaping your body, I think there are much more effective exercise routines out there.The problems this book claims to fix are - lower back pain, middle back pain, neck/shoulder, knee/foot, sciatic pain, poor posture, indigestion, leg cramps, nausea and morning sickness, sleeplessness, fatigue, headaches, TMJ, and uterine cramps. The also have a section on multiples, and labor and delivery. The only thing this fixed for me was the lower back pain, but that was my most unbearable symptom. I'm going to keep trying the other ones, and will update if anything changes.As far as getting this version or the regular miracle ball, I would probably recommend getting this one first if you are pregnant. Since the worked so well for me, I am probably going to buy the regular version as well, to see if there is anything else there to help me with my other problems or my husbands'. I am definitely going to recommend this to my pregnant friends, although I will let them try my ball first. Amazon's return policy is so great, my advice to you would be to try it out and if it doesn't work for you, just return it.