Exercise - Making Fitness a Family Affair...

Darrell Miller

10/22/05

Date: October 22, 2005 02:27 PM
Author: Darrell Miller (dm@vitanetonline.com)
Subject: Exercise - Making Fitness a Family Affair...

Making Fitness a Family Affair

Eating healthy foods begins to break the cycle of sugar highs and crashes, and help restore the children’s energy levels. But kids also have to get active, and the best way for parents to encourage activity is to exercise alongside their children. “I’ve often said that good healthy behavior is more caught then taught,” Huckabee says. “When parents live differently and model different behavior, then we start making some progress.”

Parents who exercise and eat nutritious, energizing foods together with their children promote weight management while enjoying precious family moments of good health. And it’s fun! Sharing long walks with a child may open communication channels with even the most tight-lipped teenager-fostering closeness while burning calories. During the friendly competition of a family double tennis match, parents can teach their children strategy, teamwork and sportsmanship as the pounds melt away. Parents can also strengthen a community’s resolve to fight children’s obesity by organizing neighborhood team sports activities, anything that will make it fun for kids to get away from those screens.

Chubby kids, once the scattered subjects of schoolmates’ jokes, may soon outnumber their tormentors. But any poetic justice in this shift is overshadowed by the health consequences obese children face. Adults need to set a positive example and work alongside our children towards good health. The child obesity epidemic may continue to rage, but pursuing healthy lifestyles together as families will provide us with shelter from the storm.

--
Vitanet ®