Many of us try to go to our old methods of fitness that worked a dream before we were mothers. Life was pretty great… we could do whatever we wanted, whenever we wanted. Now we have some tiny little humans, money constraints and general life craziness that dictates otherwise. So how do we successfully include fitness into our life when we are parents?
The answer is not exactly the same for everyone, but if you go through these basic check lists, you will be able to a create a mould a great little plan around how YOUR family. No one knows your family better than you do, so let’s take the lead.
- Mind set adjustment
First of all I want you to forget that old things that use to work and aren’t working now. There is no use banging your head against a brick wall, hoping this would work and feeling like a failure. We gotta get in Mum mode. Celebrate all our tiny ‘wins’ (that do add up across the day) and just alter our strategy slightly.
- What is working?
Set yourself up with a rough weekly plan Monday-Sunday. Now jot down what is actually working. Is there a class you love to attend, babysitters who help out, tag teaming workouts with Dad? Whatever it is, make sure you keep a good thing going. If nothing is working, don’t panic, step 4 has you covered.
- Jot down your weekly commitments
Quickly jot down your weekly commitments/activities. Things such as playgroup, swimming lessons, kindy pick up etc. Whatever normally goes on in a typical week for you. Then highlight where you might have opportunities to slip in a workout. So what does and ‘opportunity’ look like, I hear you say? This can be any period of time from 5-60min. It might be free time you have at home, nap time or playing time with the kids. Highlight these time and then choose your workout.
- Choose your workout
Choose a family friendly workout based on your postnatal recovery and your child development (this are additional ones to the exercise methods that are already working). My go to options are:
Tummy time workouts – Ideal home based workouts for babies not quite on the move yet & great time to focus on rehab
Walking workouts – Using a pram or baby carrier, take your walk to the next level by adding in intervals and stopping for sets of exercises
Play time workouts – There are 3 main options here. Theme based workouts, Obstacle Courses & Playground workouts. You can get more ideas from a previous blog HERE
Tag team workouts – Take turns with your partner working out. I’ll what the kids while you run on Tuesday, then we swap for Wednesday etc
Nap time workouts – a great time to add a bit of extra resistance and intensity while you don’t have little ones underfoot.
- Don’t persevere with a bad idea
Keep it fun & happy for everyone so kids have fond memories of being active with you. If its not working, quickly move onto the next one or include your kids in the process. What shall we do next? Act like dinosaurs? Let’s lunge/stomp like dinosaurs
- TWEAK TWEAK TWEAK
What happened this week is no guarantee that it will work next week. We are dealing with kids here & all sorts of things pop up in life! But at the end of your week, quickly evaluate what worked well, where you might shift things around, what different event you might have coming up. If you know that next week you have a lot of visitors, then just be gentle on yourself (set your self up for success), and tone back on a few things. Take a lighter week, so the following week you can pick the intensity again. Cycling your intensity is a normally part of training.
Your workouts don’t have to be in ‘perfect conditions’, but what you should do is TAKE IMPERFECT ACTION. Something is better than nothing, and you can’t beat that post workout endorphin rush that will put everyone in a better mood. When dealing you babies and young children, life is harder as they are still highly dependant on us. So enjoy it and know this intense phase of our life won’t last forever BUT you can still make your health a priority.
Philippa Bowman
Founder of Nurtured Fitness
Pre/Postnatal Fitness Expert
