I have a fundamental belief: Your kids should be why you workout and take care of yourself, not the reason you don’t.  They will follow your example.  Make it a good one.

I have been personal training for 10+ years and most of my clients during that time have been full time working parents.  I’ve seen both the benefits of nailing your fitness and nutrition as well as the heavy costs of neglecting it.  While parenthood creates some legitimate challenges, it’s not a get out of jail free card.

Now that my wife and I have our own little one, it’s time to practice what I preach!  I previously wrote about the newborn phase of the fit parent chronicles which you can check out HERE if you missed.  Today is all about the back to work transition!

BACK TO WORK

In addition to my own paternity leave coming to an end, Abby started her law career at a great office with an hour commute.  We’ve had to figure out how each of us can make time for workouts, eat well, get all the work things done, and still have time/energy to connect with each other and Ada.  I’m going to be honest, it’s a lot and it’s been a real adjustment we are still working on.

If I had to boil down what is working well into one phrase, I would say it is disciplined logistics.  Here is what I mean:

1. I have been very disciplined about using the “Win the Day” planner that I wrote about HERE.  It has been vital to making sure I schedule my workouts and meals, making sure I am as productive as possible with work, all while helping me keep stress down.

2. Everything in its place.  It’s so easy to get sloppy about keeping things picked up and put away.  It’s also so crazy how much friction and stress a cluttered house creates.

3. Fridays are for groceries.  I used to always get groceries on Sundays but lately I’ve found Fridays are working better.  No one is at the store so its faster.  I start the weekend with a stocked fridge so I’m less likely to blow money eating out more than I need to.  It saves us time on Sunday because…

4. Sundays are for meal prep.  Meal prep and groceries in the same day is a long day.  Luckily with the fridge already stocked on Sunday, we can get right to it.  We both have long days and we don’t want our meals to be accidents.  Hers need to be ready to throw in a cooler and most of my meals during the week are just easier if we cook some stuff in bulk.  It doesn’t have to be complicated and we certainly aren’t doing anything elaborate.  Bulk cook a couple different lean meats, bulk bake some potatoes, and make sure there are lots of fruits and veggies in the fridge.  2-3 hours of cooking on Sunday saves us a TON of time during the week while making sure we get high quality, delicious food.

5. Workouts just need to happen but they don’t need to be perfect.  Once you get it through your head that skipping workouts is not the better option, you’d be amazed what you can get done.

6. Actively limit time for things that are not important.  I am always amazing how people who are “so busy” have tons of time for netflix, hulu, social media, drinking, and drama.  Abby and I are constantly talking about what doesn’t make the cut right now.  We are not monks.  We’re still social and we enjoy leisure and treats.  We just aren’t going to shoot ourselves in the foot the way I see a lot of people waste time with unfulfilling garbage.

7. Enjoying the ride.  This is a challenging transition.  We each have big professional demands at the same time that we’ve started our family.  When something doesn’t work well, we figure out where we need to adjust as a team.  We can’t sacrifice our health due to short term “emergencies” and we can’t sacrifice enjoying the present to some mythical perfect future.

Remember: YOU CAN’T TAKE CARE OF THE BABY OR YOUR PARTNER IF YOU DON’T TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF.

When you are ready to get your fitness, nutrition, and routines working FOR you instead of AGAINST you, fill out the form at the top or bottom of this page and I will be in touch : )

Serving Portsmouth, Kittery, and the broader Seacoast community, we help people finally get in shape, feel confident, and have all day energy, even if getting everything done is a constant struggle.