A personal trainer for several years, Shelby Speiser Katz, CPT, has steadily built up a vast and loyal clientele of women who have come to rely on her for her extensive knowledge and experience in the fitness arena. Inspired by her clients, many of whom were becoming first-time moms and wanted to maintain a healthy fitness regimen that was ideal for every stage of their pregnancies, Katz decided to become certified as a prenatal and postnatal fitness specialist and has worked with countless women to help them achieve peak health during their pregnancies … and beyond.
Now Katz has taken her fitness expertise to a whole new level with The Push Program, an app she created specifically for pregnant women who want to empower themselves through tailored fitness routines geared to every stage of their pregnancies. Describing The Push Program as “holistic,” Katz said that the program promotes overall health and well-being for both mother and baby, “with exercises carefully selected to enhance maternal and fetal health.”
What sets The Push Program apart from other fitness regimens is that it is specifically programmed for not only an optimal pregnancy and labor, but also an easier recovery. “While so many prenatal programs currently on the market simply put together random ‘pregnancy-safe’ modified exercises, The Push Program deliberately trains you for your pregnancy,” Katz said. “Women I have worked with have pushed for less than 20 minutes (new moms generally push for one to three hours) and have just one-degree tears or less, because one of the major benefits of The Push Program is that it has the potential to facilitate an easier birth with pelvic mobility work and deep core strength.
“Any kind of movement during pregnancy is highly encouraged, but I like to say that pregnancy and childbirth are two of the greatest mental and physical feats that a woman can experience in her life,” Katz added. Through The Push Program women have access to a fitness regimen that allows them to train safely and effectively throughout their pregnancies, regardless of where they are, how much equipment they have, or their budgets.
One of the goals of The Push Program is to help pregnant women increase their full body strength. “Just like a runner might train for a marathon, there is no reason why a woman should not train for a healthy pregnancy and childbirth, and even for the physical demands of motherhood,” said Katz. “It’s the kind of strength that, in theory, would make it easy for a woman to carry an infant carrier with one hand and a bag of groceries in the other, all while effortlessly walking up some stairs.”
Minimizing diastasis recti, which is the separation of the vertical abdominal muscles, is yet another goal of pregnancy fitness training. Katz explained that some diastasis recti is necessary and should be expected during pregnancy in order to make room for the baby. However, it is not uncommon for there to be too much separation and it is always a good idea to try to minimize it, along with any other unnecessary core weakness that can occur at this time.
The general rule though, Katz explained, is that the moment you start to not feel good, you must stop immediately. “Don’t push yourself too hard. You have to know your body.”
Broken down into four phases, The Push Program begins with the first trimester and takes into account the fatigue, nausea and morning sickness that often accompany expectant mothers during this period. The workouts in this phase are very low-impact, do not require any great exertion, and are typically under 30 minutes. “I wanted to keep the workouts shorter so that they are relatively attainable, especially if an expectant mother would like to do them two to three times per week.”
Because many women start to get a bit of energy back in the second trimester, increasing the intensity of full body strength workouts begins, with workouts that help increase core strength, capacity and stability. Labor Intensity Interval Training is also introduced at this stage. Similar to HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training), LIIT training also has a built-in work period and rest period, meant to mimic the work and rest periods of contractions and to help train women how to conserve energy for moments of labor.
The third trimester of The Push Program is similar to the second trimester, but adds in a little more hip and pelvic mobility exercises with a little less strength training, as women tend to feel a bit more tired from the added weight as they progress through their pregnancies.
The fourth phase of The Push Program, called “Labor Prep,” concentrates on pelvic floor lengthening exercises, as well as hip and pelvic mobility. Push prep breathwork practice (an alternative method of pushing that minimizes diastasis recti and tearing) and learning recovery exercises for post-delivery also take center stage during this final phase.
The Push Program is self-paced and outlines which exercises a woman should do at any given point in her pregnancy, as well as in what order those exercises should be done. The app features a vast assortment of videos that show how to properly perform all the exercises for the upper body, lower body and core, and each video contains tips on how to customize the workouts to one’s specific fitness level.
An annual fee for The Push Program is just $20 a month (less than a dollar a day). Or, to sign up on a monthly basis, the cost $30 a month, you can have The Push Program right at your fingertips.
The Push Program will be available beginning Monday, October 14, and for readers of The Jewish Link, Katz is offering the first month free when they sign up for the annual plan with code LINK24.
To learn more about The Push Program visit pushprogramfitness.com or download the app from the App store.
On social media look for Push Program: @pushprogram and Instagram: @shelbybrooke_fitness
