I have so much going on in my life, extremely stressful things, that I have yet to find the motivation to do any real excercising. How do you do it? Also, any single parents here? How the heck do you find time to excercise???  Honestly, even though my brain could use the excercise more than my body (mmm..destress!), I am finding it sooo difficult to get it done. Just isn't enough time in the day.

Well, I've been doing better lately, because my gym has a nursery that takes babies once they are 6 months old.  (Ella turned 6 months on Dec 29, but I fudged a little.)  That means I can look forward to 2 hours to myself (for only $4!) and a chance to sit in the hot tub and take a baby-free shower every time I go.  It's still a challenge to work around her eating and napping schedule, but it's starting to help.  (Or it was until my grandmother died, I fell off my schedule and porked up at the shiva, but that was two weeks ago and I hope to be back to it soon.)  They say if you can stick to a routine for 21 days, it becomes a habit.

Of course, I'm a  SAHM, so my life is a lot less complicated than yours.  Don't beat yourself up if it's too hard.  You can only do so much.

Joy Elyse

I hear you!!!!

We have exercise equipment down in our basement, but in order to do it in the mornings before work, I'd have to get up around 3:30! I already get up between 4 & 4:15!!!  We get home from work around 4:30 pm and go non-stop until I get ds to bed around 6:30 or 7. By then, it's all I can do to make bottles and get ready for the next day, pump and go to bed by 9. Plus, I'm up nursing at least 2 times per night, sometimes more.

I really really REALLY need to lose about 50 pounds, but when???????? I am trying to follow a better eating program, and know that while I'm nursing I should lose weight healthfully and slowly, but I'm so tired of being fat!

What I do is avoid gyms at all costs. You are right, when you are busy, it takes up too much of the day. Instead, I try to do a lot of little things like parking in the far end of the lot, using stairs and not escalators/elavators. Just look for little chances to add physical movement to your day. The little changes don't take up as much of your day as trying to set aside an hour to go to the gym. Also, look at your driving habits. If you drive somewhere that is 5 minutes away, try walking that distance instead.

What really gets me moving though is our dog, she needs to go out for excercise everyday and so I strap babies on me (weight training) and walk the dog (cardio).

Kelly

So this is my motivation:

DH's office is a group of close knit people-men at the office mostly and wives are fairly friendly with each other though too.  Well they had an office tragedy last year and the healthiest guy in the office died of a major heart attack at 37 years of age.  Needless to say this was a horrendous shock to all and for them to work with him friday and get a call the next morning that he was gone was beyond words to explain.  Well all of us have been looking at  each other since then and thinking why him (sorry morbid but honest this is going somewhere good) when he was the healthiest in the office and exercised more than anyone else.  Anyway, we  decided at the beginning of January to hold a biggest loser contest of our own.  Everyone put 20 $ into the pot and there is over 380$ in there now.  Whoever loses the biggest percentage of body weight by may31st gets the pot.  Also the bosses have said they will contribute something at the end to bump up the pot.  This has been a great motivation for us, as we would love to have the $$ to spend on whatever we want.  DH and I have agreed that since neither of us could do well on this on our own, that if one of the two of us wins it, we will share it equally with the other spouse.  Anyway right now that is my motivation for anything and everything diet related.

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SAHM to Max and Zachary

Weight Loss: 10 /21 pounds (first 10 %)
Total of goal: 10/100-only 90 to go :D

Julie, what a cool motivator!  I am sorry to hear about the death of the co-worker, but glad that so many ppl are using that as a lesson to get in better health.

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--Hannah

Mama to 5 blessings

dd#1 '96, dd#2 '98, dd#3 '00, ds '02, and dd#4 '05

Thanks Hannah.  I agreee it is sad, but sometimes the strongest motivator is something like this.  I guess better this way than not at all and have it happen again.

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SAHM to Max and Zachary

Weight Loss: 10 /21 pounds (first 10 %)
Total of goal: 10/100-only 90 to go :D

My sister and her co-workers did the same thing. It works really well for them (my sister won). Of course, they only put in 10 but 40 bucks is...almost enough for a carrier!

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Ann

Mommy to Logan 8-25-05