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I love food in all kinds of ways. I'm pretty lousy at dieting in the traditional sense. Fortunately, I love to exercise too. Exercise is always my approach for losing and maintaining weight. (Thus, why I have a problem with my weight when I am pregnant and don't exercise like I do when I'm not pregnant.)
This blog is going to have a lot of fitness posts, specifically, ways mommies "can get their exercise out" as my four year old likes to say. Here is my list of guidelines when considering what physical activity you are already doing and want to start doing.
1) It has to be fun. It has to be fun to you or you won't stick with it. I love to run on the open roads but if you want to put me through a personal Hell, put me on a treadmill. Our tastes in physical activity are as varied as our tastes in food. Try different and new activities. Find what you enjoy. If you aren't enjoying yourself and if you feel that in no foreseeable future will you ever like an activity, don't do it.
2) It has to challenge you. It's been shown that we underestimate the calories we consume and overestimate how many calories we are burning. Whatever you are doing for exercise, it needs to be challenging enough that your heart rate is up and you are exerting yourself. I tried Pilates one day; I don't know if I was doing a pre-breginner level, but it felt like lifting weights without any weights. It might have been perfect for someone completely new to exercise, but for me it was just a waste of time. I think about people going for walks for exercise--you've got to be going fast enough and/or long enough for it to be of benefit to you. A 10 minute walk around the block with the kids is a start, but most likely not enough to help you meet your weight loss or weight maintenance goals.
3) It has to be within your limitations. Many of us baby ourselves the majority of the time, but every once in a while we might get grandiose and do something stupid. We don't want to injure ourselves, temporarily or permanently. I'm thinking of playing basketball competitively after a long period of inactivity and hurting backs or knees. I'm thinking of running with bad running form, or running too far or fast too quickly and injuring knees and feet. I'm thinking of trying olympic style or free-weight weight lifting with too much weight or bad form and potentially injuring any number of muscles or joints. I'm thinking of deciding to go hike a mountain unprepared and being the person on the 5:00 news the search and rescue team had to help down a mountain. Challenge yourself, but be smart.
How much physical activity should we be doing?
When I was in school, the recommendations where pretty simple: 30-60 minutes/day, most days of the week, and a recommended 60-90 minutes/day to see real weight loss benefits.
The recommendations now are little more complicated because they factor in the intensity and weight training, and are on a weekly basis. That's a little too complicated for my liking and since this is my blog, I can choose to stick to the simpler guidelines of shooting for 30 minutes or more/day.
Kids are recommended to get an hour of age-appropriate physical activity per day.
