How do I keep my family’s health on track while our lives are upside down?
Heather Sholl
Concierge Wellness Coach September 2020
How do I keep my family’s health on track while our lives are upside down?
The key to keeping everyone on track is prioritizing the family's health and setting aside time to plan with your family, not for them. Like most things, if they aren’t contributing to the decisions, it feels like life is happening to them not with them.
Set up a family meeting each week, at the same time, and stick to it. Kids are accustomed to being on teams at school and in sports and this is no different. Framing it this way helps them see themself as a contributing member and not a minion. Don’t be surprised if you're met with resistance. Even my seven year old twins gave me the side-eye when we started this and they’re fully dependent on us! Ultimately we all thrive on routine, we enjoy knowing what is happening in our lives and we appreciate, dare I say get excited about, contributing to a team.
Our 30 minute “team” meeting covers things that keep our health on track; food, activities, screen time and gratitude. I also keep us on track with sleep but that’s a day to day conversation.
Start with the menu for the week and ask everyone to choose meals they want. Then have them create the grocery list based on what they choose. Of course, parents have the final say on what the menu is, but everyone contributes. The other great thing about this discussion is you can talk about what foods to eat and why. My boys don’t like vegetables so we have a rule that they have fruit in every meal. The last thing I need on my hands is a kid who hasn’t had fiber in a week!
Then move on to activities. When we have days without activities we decide on something new to try as a family. Whether it’s a craft, a drive thru safari, a hike at Memorial, or a new cookie recipe we can always find a new thing to try together. This is a great way for working parents to have something meaningful to do with kids when they get home too!
When it comes to screen time versus human time we set limits and expectations. For the youngsters without phones or video games, we set a limit on the days and times they have access to screens. They earn screen time for chores and good deeds throughout the week and redeem them all at once. For older kids you can set a number of minutes/hours that require them to be with family. That can be the entire family or time with a family member. We tell our kids that if they'd rather spend more time with a device than a person we aren’t doing our job to create happy humans!
We end with a short list of things to be grateful for and we revisit it every day.
I hope this helps! At The Villages Gym we help individuals and families create a healthy balance at home. We offer concierge guidance for anyone who wants the best for their health!