Post Baby Bod Program Review

 

I’ve had a few requests to review the Post Baby Bod program I completed after having Little Man.  I downloaded and paid for the plan myself but I did sign up as an affiliate.  I am not being paid to do this review but some links are affiliate links! <3

Before we get started, a little friendly reminder that every pregnancy, birth, and recovery is different.  I want to give you a little back story so that you know where I’m coming from during this review, not for you to compare yourself to me.

I was in a back flare a month or two before getting pregnant, so although I had regained some of my fitness I was not at my top level.  I ran until I was 15 weeks and I worked out until 28 weeks when I started having some weird lower cramping.  I resumed walking 2-3 miles a day at around 35 weeks.  Little Mans birth was relatively uneventful except for a weird heart rate issue I had, I only pushed for 45 minutes but I did have moderate natural tearing (no episiotomy, forceps, or other interventions were needed.)  

Why I Picked This Program

Gina Harney is a fitness professional blogger who I’ve followed for years since before I started my own blog.  I’ve always enjoyed following her blog and social media because she keeps it real on so many levels. 

I connected with the fact that was extremely open with her birth stories, what she learned (and didn’t learn) in regards to postpartum fitness as a personal trainer, and why she was motivated to put together a postpartum fitness plan.  Plus, I’d been doing workouts she posts on her blog for long enough to know that she would whip my butt right into shape!  I didn’t look into other programs so I can’t say how this one compares.  

What to Expect

The plan is broken into 4-week progressive blocks.  

• 4-week foundation block 
  • This block includes strength exercises in a lower/upper split and many stroller workouts!  Sometimes the stroller workouts included strength and sometimes it was just for cardio.
• 4-week strength and stabilize block
  • 3-day muscle training split with increased weights and decreased reps.
• 4-week shred and tone block
  • Decreased weights, addition of interval workouts and smart core work.

What You Need

• stability ball (although modifications are provided without it)
• light and heavy set of dumbbells
• stroller for long walks
• athletic gear and clothing, good tennis shoes

Pros 

Clean design and layout.  Like many other programs and ebooks I’ve bought from Gina in the past, the download had a clean easy to follow approach.  

Tips on recovery and pelvic floor health.  Gina shares a whole section on promoting recovery from your birth experience, and yes, the tips go beyond “do your kegels.”  

Encouragement to pace yourself. She encourages nutrition, sleep, and hydration before exercise in the early days.  She keeps a positive tone and reiterates the need to pace yourself.  

Workouts that can be done with a baby. The first four weeks include a lot of stroller walks and stroller workouts so you can get in the habit of fitness again without leaving babe.  

Minimal equipment needed.  You actually don’t have to have anything but dumbbells, she provides modifications if you don’t have a stability ball.

Recipes & meal plans. She shares recipes and meal plans for each module of the plan.  I believe there was involvement from a Registered Dietitian here but I’m not totally sure.  I believe all the recipes are gluten-free, but she doesn’t advertise this or make any claims.  There is also minimal dairy in her recipes as well, typically just goat cheese or yogurt.   

Progressive workouts. It’s really important when beginning a fitness routine that the program you follow is periodized and progressive. In other words, let’s not just do random workouts all the time and hope we get better.  Let’s do similar workouts that build on each other so you know you are getting better.  This was a huge highlight of the program for me!  

Download.  You own the download so you can take as long as you want to finish the plan and you can repeat it if you have another baby!

Cons

Unclear exercises. Overall the exercises and workouts were straightforward. However, a few of the exercises didn’t have photos and so I googled them.  One of the workouts I wasn’t sure about the directions so I made my own up.  

Stroller workouts.  I think I’m the outlier here but I wasn’t a huge fan of the stroller workouts.  Little Man never really loved the stroller so that made things hard and if he did fall asleep he would wake up the minute the stroller stopped moving.  Plus I didn’t like working out where I couldn’t see my form and everyone else could see me.  I felt kind of like I was “on display” for the neighborhood despite no one even looking or caring.  

Slow cardio ramp up.  I was ready to run pretty quickly but the plan had a much slower cardio ramp up.  I just added in running as I saw fit.  

Not repeatable.  Most workout plans you buy you can repeat again and again, however, because this one is designed specifically postpartum you probably wouldn’t want to repeat it until you had another baby or an extended break from exercise.  

My Thoughts

Overall, I really enjoyed the program and had a great experience with it.  As I said, the stroller workouts really weren’t my thing during the first four weeks.  To modify, I just did a walk with Little Man then came home and did the moves I was supposed to do with the stroller as a circuit.  That worked great for us and after the first 4 weeks, there aren’t any additional stroller workouts.  

Would I recommend the Post Baby Bod program to a friend? Heck yes!  It’s so important to be safe when beginning a fitness regimen postpartum.  Group exercise classes and other programs would fail to provide the much-needed ramp up and abdominal safe exercises.  

How did you get back into fitness after having a baby?  How did you find the time to exercise?  

Home workouts are essential for me!  

PS Messages and comments asking to buy the plan for reduced prices from me or others will not be approved.