Changing Shape with Carol Smillie
£12.99, Universal Pictures Video, released 27 March 2000.
This video doesn’t claim
to change your life, unlike most fitness videos. What it does offer is some fitness tips
for pregnancy and a plan to get back in shape after having a baby.
The pregnancy section is gentle, informative and very low impact, so wouldn’t tax
any mum-to-be.
And there’s no pressure to leap into your Lycra straight after having your baby:
the postnatal exercises start at six weeks and only after you’ve had your check-up.
The levels are colour-coded so it’s easy to fast forward the tape to the section
you need. Mums are encouraged to take the baby for a walk and capitalise on the 15 minutes
after you return when the baby will, hopefully, still be asleep. The video successfully
takes advantage of the very few times that a mum might have free time to fit in some
exercise.
The exercises aren’t too daunting, the key is in the repetition rather than going
for the burn. All in all, it’s a well-targeted video offering help to new mums that
they might struggle to find elsewhere, particularly if they are not keen on a trip to the
gym.
