When my wife and I found out we were having a baby, and after the initial excitement tapered down, we were immediately inundated with the logistics of having a baby in New York City. What hospital to give birth in? How would we navigate work? Did we need to move into a bigger place?

We had a difference of opinion on most of these decisions, and we had many healthy debates about what direction we were going to take our life. One area where there was absolutely no disagreement was that we were going to keep working out. We agreed that if the other person wanted to make time for a workout, no matter what else the other person was doing (within reason), they would drop everything to make sure it was easy for the workout to happen.

One year in, this is still happening. Just yesterday I was dressed and ready to go and meet a friend when my wife expressed an interest to go to a fitness class. I whipped out my phone and pushed back my meeting by a couple hours. While this is an extreme case, and luckily my friend was the very flexible type, it shows the importance we place on fitness.

Why? Well for starters, purely selfish, who doesn’t like their partner to be in sick shape? But more importantly, when you’re healthy, you feel good about yourself and these good feelings pour into other areas of your life.

It’s easy enough to make your own excuses about why you don’t have time to workout, so it’s important your partner doesn’t add one more.

Make it easy for your partner. It’ll pay dividends.

Here are my two go to workouts when I only have 15 minutes to spare (and we always have 15 minutes to spare). The best part is that baby can watch from the stroller or pack and play. Set a healthy and good example from early on.

Workout 1

Running Tabata on treadmill.

Part 1. 5 minute warm-up

Part 2. Raise incline to max. Put speed slightly faster than your warm-up pace. Stand on edge of running treadmill while you make the adjustments

Part 3.  Jump on treadmill for 20 seconds. After 20 seconds jump off for a 10 second rest. Repeat this 8 times, increasing the speed for each interval (this gets hard fast, but only lasts a total of 4 minutes).

Part 4. 5 minute jog warm-down

Workout 2

5 minute warm-up (light jogging or stretching)

For ten minutes do as many round of the following

5 pullups

10 pushups

15 airsquats