I think most new moms would agree that finding the time and energy to work out after having a baby is a pretty big challenge. Sure, some women are able to leap up from the delivery table and hit the road for a quick five-miler with their jogging stroller, but many of us normal humans spend weeks (months?) too wiped out to even consider the Herculean effort of cramming our ridiculous postpartum hooters into an exercise bra.

Thank goodness for the ingenious Smiling Sling, which solves so many problems at once: you use your actual baby as a living gym weight, so there's no reason you can't start working up a sweat right after you give birth -- AND it keeps you physically strapped to your infant, so there's no excuse whatsoever for you to have a single, solitary moment of child-free time!

Uh, yay?

Okay, I shouldn't snark about a product that clearly means well. After all, the Smiling Sling claims to enable the wearer to perform a variety of exercises designed to gain strength, improve physical health, and promote weigh loss. What exhausted new mom doesn't want to feel better and fit in her non-maternity jeans again? It sounds ideal!

Still, I look at the pictures of all the happy moms holding babies in the air (and sometimes directly over their faces airplane-style, WARNING WARNING HALF-DIGESTED MILKSPEW ARRIVAL IN 3 ... 2 ...) and I just want to come pat these women gently on the back and offer to babysit or something, because dude, seriously, trying to get in a workout is hard enough without actually being STRAPPED to your kid.

I mean, there are a lot of physical benefits to getting back in the exercise routine after you have your baby. I learned this after my second pregnancy, when instead of collapsing on the couch during naptime, I stuck my son in a swing and popped in a workout DVD. It was rough going, but eventually I felt more energized despite the sleep deprivation -- and I lost the weight much faster than I did the first time around.

Whenever I could, though, I left our baby with my husband so I could actually work out on my own. That made all the difference in the world -- to feel like I was doing something just for myself, even if it was only for a short amount of time here and there.

That's what strikes me as a little depressing about the Smiling Sling. There's also the fact that it looks kind of nerve-rackingly complicated (hell, I used to flip out making sure my Mei Tai baby carrier was on right, this thing would give me hives), but mostly it's that it seems to be custom designed so Mom doesn't get a break. Never. EVERRRRRR.

What do you think of the Smiling Sling? Would you enjoy working out this way?


Image via Smiling Sling