When you become a parent, you can no longer think just of yourself. Having children means being more responsible for your health, while setting a better example for them. It can be difficult juggling family life with work, and finding the time to improve your health can seem impossible, but fortunately there are some things you can easily work into your daily routine.
If you’re finding it difficult to squeeze in time to exercise, an easy solution is to simply get on your feet and walk more. Need to pick up some milk from the corner shop? Leave the car at home and walk. Find yourself emailing colleagues in the office when they sit a few metres away? Get up and speak to them instead.
Wearable fitness trackers are becoming a popular way of monitoring fitness and activity, and they can really help to spur you on to achieving that day’s goal. Devices such as Fitbit’s Charge HR even monitors your sleep quality and heart rate and can be synced with other apps such as MyFitnessPal. Which brings us on to…
If you're a smoker, maybe try switching to e-cigarettes
One of the biggest things you can do to improve your health is to quit smoking cigarettes. Tobacco cigarettes contain around 3-4000 chemicals, around 60 of which are known carcinogens. As well as tar and carbon monoxide, cigarettes also contain many other nasty chemicals, including butane, arsenic and ammonia. No wonder that the tobacco is linked to around 100,000 deaths per year in the UK alone.
Increasingly, smokers are turning to e-cigarettes as a means of quitting tobacco. These electronic devices mimic the sensation of smoking, and usually contain nicotine but none of the cancer causing chemicals. In fact, most e-cigs only contain around 10-15 chemicals on average.
If you haven’t come across e-cigs before, they are made up of a battery, a tank or cartridge and e-liquid. The battery causes a metal coil in the tank or cartridge to heat up and vaporises the e-liquid. The vapour that is produced is inhaled just as if you were smoking.
Eat better
That’s right, eating healthier foods is a key part of improving your overall health. What a coincidence! Eating a balanced diet of nutritious food is the absolute key to getting (and remaining healthy). Without a healthy diet, exercise on its own can only achieve so much, so important to ensure that you’re eating plenty of fruit and vegetables, and getting the right mix of protein, carbs and fats.
An app like MyFitnessPal works wonders here, allowing you to record exactly what foods you are eating, while displaying your nutritional macros, helping you to maintain the right balance. Once its synced up to your fitness tracker, you’ll also get a clearer idea what impact your daily exercise has had on your calorific burn. If you walk that extra mile in the morning, you can celebrate with a (small) slice of cake in the afternoon!
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