Build up to exercise ½ hour minimum per day. The steady daily exercise helps speed up metabolism and weight loss. Mika & I walk more than 30 min. per day now, but when we started, we were only walking may 4 days a week for 60 min. WW recommends 30 MIN. PER DAY and that is part of the whole plan, along with the low fat eating and journaling, etc. So, I suggest building to *daily* exercise. I have learned that, now that I am working on maintaining my weight loss, besides still sticking to a low fat eating lifestyle, the daily exercise is *critical!*
If you have a dog, walk it! If you don't, walk yourself. Get up earlier, walk at lunch break or right after work before returning home to get sucked into family stuff. Get an exercise video and do it. Join a gym. :P Even do your exercise before dinner or before bed. BUT PICK A CONSISTENT TIME AND STICK TO IT. Your body will begin to expect the workout at a certain time and "gear up" for it, reminding you it's time to exercise. :P If you write it in your calendar or daybook, and commit to it, and do it, and stick up for yourself, to not let your 30 min. be pushed aside, but you fit it in no matter what (unless someone needs to go to the ER!). :P My family knows morning walks are a daily schedule for me, and even when they are around, we don't plan family stuff until after I've had my walk with Mika dog. ;) I also get up earlier and walk, too, when something special is scheduled. But that walk time is MINE and I don't give it up easily. Just like being strong and disciplined with the eating, measuring portions, exercise has to be a daily part of it.
It takes about 3 months I used to read, to form a new habit, so give yourself the time, and keep whittling away every day, until you've established your workout schedule. And train your family, ROFL! ;)
Also, family support and encouragement is very important, and I sat down to discuss my starting WW and outlining what I needed from DH & DD, before I began it. And if they forget, I remind them, the daily exercise *must* happen. Just like I support them and help them, I expect the same in return. To me, that's how families should work, and kids should grow up understanding. Everybody in the family is important and needs the rest of the family to help them. Sometimes we forget to take care of ourselves. If we don't bring it up, our family may not realize our health is on the line. If we don't ask our DH to watch over the kids for 30 min., if needed, exercise may not happen. Etc. We have to state what we need, and work with family to meet *OUR* needs as well as theirs. If we are healthy, our families benefit. They don't benefit if we are martyrs who are in poor health, energy level, etc., right? ;)
Blessings,
Gypsy
)O(
"What is life? It is the flash of a firefly in the night.
It is the breath of a buffalo in the wintertime.
It is the little shadow which runs across the grass
and loses itself in the sunset.
- Crowfoot, Blackfoot warrior and orator
Dog fighting is cruelty, which is a human activity and a human illness.
It's not the dog's fault.
All dogs need to be evaluated as individuals."
--Tim Racer, one of BAD RAP's founders
http://www.badrap.org/rescue/
Mika Dog
"All things share the same breath;
the beast, the tree, the man.
The Air shares its spirit with
all the life it supports."
--Chief Seattle
"If there are no dogs in Heaven,
then when I die I want to go where they went."
~Will Rogers
"The greatness of a nation and its moral progress
can be judged by the way its animals are treated."
~~Mahatma Gandhi
"Life is a state of mind." ~~from Being There.
