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Parenting workouts: Christmas lights switch on

Fun Christmas activities like watching the Christmas lights being switched on are a great way to combine fun with healthy movement and activity.

This post highlights the complimentary benefits of:

  1. Parent workouts, which use daily life and its challenges to grow fitter and stronger
  2. Road to Christmas, which teaches you how to enjoy indulgent feasts in a healthy way.

This article was written over 10 years ago, but it is as relevant today as it was then. Parenting is full of movement challenges that, when handled properly, make you strong. With the right teacher, you will grow from them and enjoy your parenting experience more.

Without the right support, you are likely to overwork yourself and get injured, leading to a bad experience.

The lights switch on

Over the last weekend, I had an experience that made me realize how tiring and challenging it can be for parents to take care of their little ones. We attended the Milton Keynes official Christmas lights switch-on, and I had to carry my child for about one to two hours.

It may not sound like much, but when everyone around you has their kids on their shoulders, it can be tough for your child to see anything if they’re not carried. So, I had to carry him around for the entire time. Aha, all the parents now feel my pain!!!

Everyone is standing
Everyone is standing

The day after, I could tell I had done a proper workout because I felt as tired and sore as if I had done a serious weights session. The little man is three this week and pretty much at the top percentile for height for his age, and he is getting pretty strong. All this means he is getting heavier.

So, during the wee,k I introduced him to the scales and guess how much this little bundle of energy weighs

dun dun dah

3 stone!!! Yep, I was carrying 3 stone of weight, which is 20 kilos in new money.

It may not seem like a lot, but carrying my little one was not the only thing I was doing. I also had to carry a backpack filled with drinks, snacks, spare clothes, nappies, and other parent essentials – which is basically half of my house!

We walked around the shopping centre and did other things too, so we may have walked 1-2 miles in total. Even though it was just a short trip, I realized how much extra baggage comes along with taking toddlers out and how much work it really is.

Tons of fun

We had a ton of fun, and it was all worth it, which is, for me, the point of a parent workout. The stats I share will hopefully help you understand just how much of a workout you can get just having fun with your family. It is never to make you feel bad, but instead, it is to free you up to just get on with your life.

The main value of a parent workout over a gym workout is that the best workout is specific to what you need to work on. I would say to you that nothing will make you strong and healthy enough to enjoy a day with your family like having a day with your family.

The movements you get with a gym are like processed food. They satisfy you but lack all that is needed to really make you strong and fit enough to enjoy your days.

The Movements involved

Lifting a child onto your head to carry them and lifting them back down again is a very natural activity, but it is not something you do at the gym or are taught as a fitness instructor how to train for. We just don’t generally think about these everyday movements as something we train for in the gym.

We assume that somehow the training we do in the gym will translate into benefits outside it, and the truth is that the benefit you gain from training depends directly on how relevant and specific that training is to the activity. So much of what we do in the gym helps with some parts of our lives and our activities but not the whole. Far from it. There fore there a lot of improvement that we can make.

The specific movements that were utilised included:

  • Squats
  • Lunges
  • Shoulder press
  • Tricep press
  • Weighted walking

The movement to get a child onto your shoulders is very similar to the clean-and-jerk movement from the Olympic weightlifting routine.

I’m not suggesting you practice the clean and jerk itself. I am giving you a comparison of lifts used in weight lifting and how they reflect real-life activities.

The support required

Long-term standing and walking with a child, particularly an extra 3 stone, is a big challenge. The weight being over my shoulders is not a normal place to carry this weight in modern life.

There is much more weight on my spine which can cause damage particularly if I do this often and for longer periods.. It used to be common, and we used to be adapted to it, but not any longer.

It puts pressure on all the supporting movement structures, including:

  • Spine
  • Hips
  • Knees
  • Ankles
  • Feet

All these structures benefit from preparation in advance; otherwise, they will suffer, which will lead to pain and injury.

Mobility work is also a necessity to ensure a proper range of movement in the relevant joints.

Athletic movements

The act of getting a child onto your shoulders and back down is an athletic movement. The heavier the child is and the bigger they are, the more athletic the movement becomes.

You need good coordination and strength to channel the forces properly through your body, particularly your spine, back and hips. Any good physical trainer or physiotherapist can advise on good movement techniques and relevant training, but when I worked in gyms, no one thought to mention this type of activity as something to train for.

Similarly, walking around with a child on your shoulders makes normal movement a lot harder than usual.

Learn to ACT

Every activity is an opportunity to invest in yourself. For best results, match the activity with a relevant course and teacher. See How it works for more.

Activity

Related activity type

Course

Explains the benefits

Teacher

Guides you through

p.s.

Parenting is tough, but you can turn that challenge into fun and a workout at the same time. If you want to find out how to get fit by doing the things you love like I do, then checkout parent workouts

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