“The Perfect Postnatal Workout”

With Karyne Steben and baby Azia.

I was rather curious when I sat down to watch this video, as Karyne Steben is a trapeze artist of 11 years, formerly with Cirque de Soleil ! Would she and baby be hanging from the chandelier and would she be stretching her legs behind her ears? The video proved quickly, however, to be a sane, charming and ‘low key’ affair with baby very much in focus!

The video is divided up into sections;

	A short work-out for the first month
	Two 15 minutes work-outs for after the 6 weeks’ check
	A 12 minutes instructional section where Karyne explains the dos and don’ts of postnatal exercise.

There is a disclaimer at the beginning, especially regarding the safety of the baby. It is, however, quite difficult to attend properly to Karyne’s heavy accent and you have to know in advance that “Kegles” means pelvic floor lifts.

The first section consists of five exercises only, including “kegles” and pelvic tilts with abdominal transversus retraction. A challenging exercise at this stage would in my mind be the ‘hip lift’/bridging exercise. This should have been left for the next section. Throughout the baby is in focus; cradled or swaddled on the floor.

Workout 2 is apparently for after week 4, containing 12 exercises in all. It includes interesting “labour squats”, which is a sequence of large body ripples into a full squat and recover. (Not suitable for the “untrained” mother.) Karyne uses the weight of the baby quite a bit, especially for the arm exercises, such as swinging the baby back and forth in an arm cradle whilst in a high kneeling position, and in “half leg extensions” for the transverses abdominal with baby ’out flying’, resting on her shins holding on to mums hands. Other more traditional exercises such as press-ups, curl- ups and “kegles” alongside a few stretches were also in there.

Workout 3 contains more challenging exercises, such as deep squatting “swoops” with baby, oblique work and bridging/hip lifts.

The Instructional section is good with up-to-date researched based references, nutritional advice and information about the exercises. I was pleased that she referred to post-natal depression and the ‘blues’, by urging mums to seek help or talk to their doctor if they feel negative towards themselves or their baby.

Karyne suggests feeding baby half an hour before exercising and mentions that the milk may taste differently immediately after exercising. But it is only when someone works beyond their training zone that this is likely to happen.

She refers to abdominal diastasis, checking the ‘gap’, and urges mums to pay attention to baby whilst exercising: “if she is not enjoying it, go on to the next exercise”. Baby Azia seemed to enjoy all of it though, and when not participating was swaddled on the floor in front of Karyne.

One very important point.

The instructional section is placed at the end of the tape and not at the beginning so that postnatal mothers (and pregnant mothers) who do the workout frequently can use the tape without having to fast forward past this every time. There is a clear voiceover asking anyone who is viewing the tape for the first time to fast-forward 36 minutes to watch the instructional section. This instruction section is important so new users should take the trouble to fast forward to this section before using the workout video.

All in all, this is a refreshing postnatal exercise video with a pleasant and low-key ambiance. The music is very soothing for the first 2/3 of it, which prevents sensorial overload. The demonstrations are clear and the exercises mainly simple. It can provide us PNEX teachers with many good and charming ideas for exercising together with baby, which is for many the only realistic way for the first few months!

2003 Far Star Productions, Inc. California, USA

To order visit: www.progressiveparent.com

Solrun Fluge-Faull