Making Time to Exercise When You're a Single Parent
You're a busy, make that verging on being completely overwhelmed, single parent. You've heard exercise is good for you and maybe you need to lose a few pounds. But how in the world are you going to carve out a piece of your schedule to devote to exercise?
Often the easiest way to exercise is to do it at home. This way, you are available to your kids and don't have to worry about getting someone to watch them. You don't need fancy equipment to get fit. Probably the easiest home workout is to use is exercise videos.
Don't have enough money to go buy a bunch of videos? After all, you need variety so you don't get too bored. There are several ways to get exercise videos on the cheap. Your local library may have videos available. Yard sales can be an excellent way to get videos for next-to-nothing. Often, people are getting rid of their VCRs and selling the exercise videotapes cheaply. So, make sure you have a VCR to take advantage of the deals. Thrift shops sometimes have exercise videos. You could also use a service like Netflix where you pay a low monthly fee to rent multiple videos. This can also be an excellent way to preview videos so that you can decide which ones you would be interested in buying. There are also workout shows on television. In particular, FitTV and Lifetime channel have some great workouts. You could even record them so that you can do the workouts repeatedly.
Free weights can be used for strength training. You might start out with a couple sets of dumbbells, and buy additional sets as you get stronger. Or, there are dumbbell sets that allow you to add plates to an existing set to increase the weight. Again, you can sometimes find dumbbells at yard sales or thrift stores. A good book to get started with weight lifting is Weightlifting for Dummies. Resistance bands are also a good choice for home exercisers. An added bonus is that there is less of a chance that your child will drop a dumbbell on his or her toe or brandish it as a weapon at a sibling.
A mini trampoline can be a good buy for a single parent family. Jumping on a trampoline is great exercise, and your kids would probably enjoy using it, too. This might not be a good option if you have young children, since they could injure themselves on it if you don't have a good storage place.
Even something as simple as a jump rope can offer a good home workout for the time and cash-strapped single parent. Or, you could jog in place while watching TV or listening to music. If you have kids of stroller age, get a jogging stroller and run behind them. If your kids are older, get used bikes for everyone and take a ride. Install a basketball goal and shoot hoops with the kids. Take your kids on walks and if you have a dog, bring it, too, Everyone would benefit from even a walk around the block.
You can incorporate exercise into your busy day if you exercise at home. Even a ten-minute workout will yield benefits to your body and stress level. And, home exercise can be free or low-cost. You can be a single parent and have time to exercise!
