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MEGAN Garcia has two heel marks on her bedroom door from practicing yoga hand stands every night.
Even though the plus-size model has been teaching yoga for over a decade, she still can't do a handstand. It's also difficult for her to master downward dog or chatarunga dandasana, some basic yoga moves.
"Before I started teaching, my instructors never made specific comments to accommodate different body parts," says 30-something Garcia, a size 18 who weighs about 210 pounds.
"I'm a big-breasted woman and in upside-down poses, my breasts would hang up to my face. It was very awkward and uncomfortable. I have a larger belly than most yoga students. I would never understand why in a twist it would always feel compressed, like someone was on my stomach."
Having struggled with a practice that presents special challenges for plus-size women, Garcia is now helping others in the same boat, with yoga instruction specifically tailored to larger body types.
The 5-foot-9 beauty, who has graced the cover of Figure magazine, teaches group classes and individual sessions at various Upper West Side locations, by appointment. Trained in Iyengar yoga, Garcia has developed techniques and poses that work for larger women, some using straps, blocks and chairs.
"Someone who has a lot of flesh in their upper back can't clasp their hands behind their back because they can feel the flesh of their shoulders getting in the way," she says.
Garcia knows that in child pose, someone with a big stomach needs assistance opening up their knees so they can get the stretch.
Also, "People who have big breasts have a lot of tightness in the pectoral muscles, so we need a lot of heart openers and arm stretches, so I do 'wall clocks,' which are moving your arms along the wall to open up the chest."
Garcia has just released a new DVD: "Yoga: Just My Size," which offers a 30-minute workout with beginner exercises, stretches and breathing techniques.
Leticia Mateo, a plus-size woman who drives an hour to the city for the class twice a week, says Garcia has changed her life.
"She's fantastic and she knows exactly what a plus-size woman goes through," says the 35-year-old computer technician manager.
"It's amazing to have a role model who's not perfect. Now you can't say, 'I can't do it.' "
Garcia insists yoga is not only for thin people.
"Yoga is for everybody," she says. "There's nothing sexier and more beautiful than a woman who takes pleasure in beauty and life. I don't keep doing exercise because it will make me thin or to fit into Ralph Lauren pants. I do it because it feels so good."
"You know the before and after pictures? I am the after."
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