In the business of our everyday, hustle and bustle, it’s hard sometimes, impossibly hard to even think about finding time for...Mom! Will you ever have time to work off those last 10 pregnancy pounds or get ready for swimsuit season with a baby in your arms and another at your feet? As a mom of three, I know first-hand how hard it is to work outside and inside the home full-time and incorporate healthy habits like exercise into my day.
Finding time to think about yourself, is a very common problem in motherhood. Typically Moms give 100 percent plus of their time to everyone else in the family and forget to schedule a small percent of time for themselves. I use the word schedule here, because you have to schedule the time or it will never happen. The day will slip through your fingers and at day's end you will be too tired and all you want to do is rest! A healthy mom, is important, so you have to make time for fitness, at some point, during the week.
Here are a few tips to help mom find that time to incorporate fitness into the chaos:
1. Find a time each day where you can slip away. For me, I know if I do not work out in the morning, it's not going to happen. So at this stage in my life, the morning is my time. Yeah that means I get up earlier than I need to, but that extra hour in the morning for me sets my day. If I miss a morning workout, my day just feels different. I am less productive and usually more tired if I miss that morning me-time.
Maybe for you it's lunch-time or evening time? Find the time that everyday you can take 30 minutes to one-hour for you. Schedule it and be consistent. If you can't be consistent each day, that's the wrong time for you. Find that consistency.
2. Weekend Warriors. Use the weekend as time to play and be active with your family. Take a family bike ride. If you have little ones, pop on a bike trailer, and go for a spin. The bigger kids, have their own bikes. Blow off the dust and go, go, GO. Take a family walk around a few blocks. Push little ones in the stroller and/or use this time to get reconnected to the older kids. Pool Time. Here comes the summer and time to hit the pool. Take "breaks" from the lounge chair and get in the water and play with the kids.
3. Join a gym with chihildcare and kid's activities. In my experience Moms who make the commitment to a gym membership find it easier to find that consistent time each day to exercise. Many gyms help by offering on-site childcare, kid's classes and activities. Modeling a healthy lifestyle to your children will help them as they get older incorporate exercise into their lives. If exercise is important to you then it will be important to your family. Being a healthy and fit mom, translates to a happy and healthy family. Reconfigure your world with exercise in it–you are worth it!
