As stay-at-home moms, we face challenges that are unique in health and fitness. We usually have small children who need constant love and attention. We are sleep deprived, and are always working within the margins of time available to us. This makes even thinking about our own health and fitness difficult and seemingly impossible. As a stay-at-home mother of four, I had to come to terms with my reality regarding my health and fitness. I swallowed some hard pills going through trial and error in my own health and fitness for a decade! My hope is to prevent other mothers from wasting their time by sharing some health and fitness tips I’ve learned over time.
Who are these health and fitness tips for?
In the world of health and fitness, there are many goals that a person can pursue, regardless of their parental status. This post is specifically for the stay-at-home mother whose goal is to keep up with their children, feel good in her own skin, and still have time for her family and to-do list. My goal for this post is to give simple tips and actionable steps that you can take right now to look and feel good.
But, let me clarify something. This is not a post for losing weight. You may lose weight as a result of following these tips, especially if you are currently overweight or obese. However, that is not the goal of this post. There is a lot of money in the weight loss industry, often fueled by clickbait, self-hate and desperation. The reality is that losing weight is rarely thought out in a way that’s sustainable and long term. If weight loss is your goal, consider following and mastering these tips first.
Now, back to those tips!
Tip #1: Increase your step count
Increasing your step count is an easy way to make a difference in your current state of health and fitness. Your steps roughly measure your movement during the day. The higher your step count, the more movement you likely put in.
Many fitness influencers tout the 10,000 steps goal, but you don’t need to walk that much. While 10,000 steps sounds like a sexy number to throw in a post or a community challenge, it’s really an arbitrary number. There’s no magic around 10,000. However, this idea does have an origin story. A marketing campaign for a pedometer created 10,000 steps a day during the wake of the 1964 Olympics. That year, the Olympics was held in Japan. The kanji for 10,000 looks like a person walking (一万, ichiman), and the pedometer was called the Manpo-kei, or the 10,000 steps meter.
So, if there’s no magic behind the number 10,000 steps, what should be your goal? Using your smart watch or a cheap pedometer, go about your daily life for two weeks or so. You’ll get a realistic picture of your current average step count. Once you figure this out, add 500 steps. If your current average step count is 2,500 steps/day, then aim for 3,000 steps/day. When you hit 3,000 steps/day, give or take 100-200 steps, for a couple of weeks, give yourself another increase of 500 steps. That would mean aiming for 3,500 steps/day.
One of the easiest ways to get more steps in is to take a walk outside or on a treadmill for 10 minutes after every meal. When I walk on the treadmill at 2.5-3.0 mph, I find that I can get in about 1,000 steps every 10 minutes. By that measure, I’d get around 3,000 steps/day from doing this.
Tip #2: Increase protein intake
If you feel like you struggle with too much snacking or cravings, it’s possibly due to not eating enough protein. Protein is satiating and helps you feel fuller for a longer period of time, making it difficult to overeat. Sufficient protein intake also helps your body maintain muscle mass. This is important because muscle helps you burn calories, maintain strength, and stay healthy. Finally, many protein sources contain important micronutrients such as B vitamins, essential fatty acids, zinc, iron, and vitamin E, all of which are essential for your health and fitness.
Eating enough protein, especially for women, is a vital part of health and wellness. The recommended daily allowance (RDA) for protein is 0.8g per 1kg, or 0.36 lbs, of body weight. I believe this is too low. By this measure, a woman at 150lbs body weight would eat 54g of protein. This is equivalent to eating only 6 oz of chicken breast per day. Amazingly, most women aren’t even eating that much protein per day.
If the RDA of protein for women is too low, what would be a better recommendation? There are a few methods for figure out the ideal protein intake. However, it should be noted that none of them are perfect, and it will take time for you to find the right amount of protein for you as an individual.
Online macro calculator
One way is to use a calculator online. This macro calculator from Legion Athletics is a pretty good one to start with. This way is very easy and direct to the point. However, the calculator is limited by its data, using averages of a cohort of people. This means that it may not always give you a good fit.
Body fat percentage chart
The next way is to use your lean body mass as a gauge for your protein intake. You would search for a body fat percentage image chart (try searching something like, ‘body fat percentage chart women’ on Google). Find the woman in the chart whose body appears most like yours. Then, using the number associated with the photo, multiply that number as a decimal by your weight. This will be the protein intake (in grams) that you aim for. While this is another easy way to find your protein goal, it suffers the same drawbacks as the macro calculator.
Height in centimeters
This last method is my preferred method. Take your height in centimeters, multiply it by 0.8, and that’s your protein goal. I am 163cm tall, so my protein goal is around 130g/day. I find that, when I meet this goal, give or take 20g, I feel great, have minimal cravings, and maintain musculature pretty easily.
Tip #3: Drink enough water (and seeing if electrolytes make sense for you)
You’ve heard all the fitness influencers tell you, “First thing, every morning, I have a cup of water/lemon water,” or something like that. While the water part is recommended, it doesn’t have to be first thing in the morning, nor with a lemon. Don’t overcomplicate it!
Why hydration so important? All tissues, organs and cells in your body use water to regulate temperature and function. Your body consistently loses water through breathing, sweating and digestion. It depends on water for its very existence and core functions. Water is a seriously underrated issue.
About electrolytes. When in proper balance, electrolytes play a role in muscle contraction, keep water levels balanced in and out of our cells, and manage sweating and organ function. I find when I meet my hydration requirements with electrolytes, I don’t go to the bathroom all day. If you feel like you’re spending days taking trips to the bathroom, try adding electrolyte powder to your water. Many people like LMNT due to it’s growing popularity among fitness influencers. But I enjoy Re-Lyte from Redmond Life for it’s taste and lower price point.
However, understand that electrolytes are not entirely necessary. The main thing is getting in your fluids. If you aren’t intentionally meeting your hydration, start with slowly increasing your fluid intake over time. Audit yourself by recording your intake unchanged, then from there, make small, incremental increases until you meet your hydration goal.
For your hydration goal, take your current body weight, divide it in half, and drink that amount in ounces every day. Coffee, tea, milk, etc, can count toward your hydration goal, but I advise getting at least half your goal in water (with electrolytes if you want). Make it easy for yourself to meet this goal by getting it all together each morning. This way, you have your water all day. There’s a reason the 40oz Stanley cups are so popular. You only need to fill it 1-2 times a day, depending on your other sources of hydration. Personally, I opt for a cute Simple Modern tumbler for its lower price point and the fact that it’s nearly spill-proof.
Tip #4: Add a muscle building activity to your regimen
There is a lot of confusion about whether cardio or strength workouts are better for your health and fitness. The truth is, both are important! Cardio activities, such as running, biking, etc, are wonderful for cardiovascular health. Strength training will help you build muscle, which gives you shape and keeps you young. There is a strong correlation between good health and muscle tissue on bodies (assuming no steroids).
But wait, doesn’t cardio burn more calories than strength training? During the workout, yes. While this post is not about weight loss, I’d like to mention that strength training burns calories in a different way. Strength training builds muscle mass, which increases your metabolism. Metabolism refers to how your body expends energy (calories) over time. If strength training increases your metabolism, you are increasing the amount of calories you’re burning over time (assuming calories remain the same). So, yes, while cardio burns, on average, about 10-12 calories/minute, and strength training, 2-3 calories/minute, you will experience a generally higher calorie burn over time.
If you’re a beginner in strength training, I recommend meeting with a personal trainer for 3-4 weeks to learn proper technique and the basics of building a workout plan. As a stay-at-home mother, my plan is 2-3 days/week, with a 20-30 minute full body workout. In this season of my life, I mostly work with body weight or dumbbells.
There are lots of videos on YouTube with great content creators who are also trainers. Some of my favorite plans I’ve done come from Mind Pump, Jeff Nippard, and Bret Contreras. If you are post partum and have the green light from your OB or midwife, I love Girls Gone Strong. I have used some form of workout program from all these channels and loved every season I’ve experienced with them.
Tip #5: Manage your stress
As stay-at-home mothers, we struggle HARD with this one. We feel the need to be strong, to be the rock for our family. Some look at us with admiration and ask, “Wow, you have [insert number] kids, homeschool, cook from scratch and [insert other things you do in your life]? How do you manage it all?!” But deep down, we’re asking ourselves the same question. Sometimes, we are managing well, and it feels like we’re flying by the seat of our pants when we’re doing so. Other times, we S T R E S S about how we’re not really managing well and need to change something.
Like hydration, among the health and fitness tips we hear from fitness influencers is how important it is to manage your stress levels. There’s a reason for this, but as stay-at-home mothers, it’s quite challenging for us! I didn’t mention this in the introduction of this post, but one reason we tend to put on weight after we have children is due to not managing stress. No, stress in and of itself does not make us gain weight (keep in mind, there’s a lot of highly stressed parents, in countries where food is much less available, who are quite underweight). It tends to be the fact that many of us turn to food to cope with stress, and food is usually highly available.
Following the previous tips can help a lot with managing cravings, but managing stress will help tremendously. Many people, especially parents who feel like they can’t use the coping mechanisms they had before becoming parents, turn to comfort foods and drinks to cope with their stresses. When left unchecked, this could lead to undesirable outcomes like weight gain, sluggishness and lower self esteem. The truth is that we are not good at quantifying much of anything (hence the party game where you guess how many candies or objects are in a jar), including our caloric intake. It’s easy to think, “oh, it’s just one chocolate, one bag of chips, one cookie, etc,” but it does add up.
Ways to manage stress
Here are some tips to try for managing the stress:
- Journaling. This one has been a life saver for me. It’s helped me get my feelings out, figure out what’s worth thinking about, create goals and plans for those goals, make to-do lists, everything. People seem intimidated by journaling, especially after seeing people create these beautiful journals, or these lovely, poetic messages about their lives, and post them on social media. My husband, Ray, was one of those who felt intimidated. He would watch me write many pages in my journal and think to himself that he is not a writer. He was trying to make himself fit journaling, but in reality, he should make journaling fit him. He didn’t need to be a writer. You don’t need to be super creative and make beautiful pages in your journal like those on social media. You just need to make your journal whatever you need it to be. Ray literally writes a sentence here and there when he’s at work and having thoughts or feelings about something. He told me that, one time, he literally wrote one sentence and broke down crying because it was the release he needed. Grab yourself a notebook and a pen, and write. Share it with someone if you want, or don’t.
- Take a walk/exercise. There are multiple studies that show walking (especially in nature or just outside) and getting regular exercise can help reduce stress and the affects of stress. It’s also great for kids to see their mother taking care of themselves by exercising and getting walks in regularly. It sends a good message about self care and maintaining our physical and mental health. And if this helps you reduce stress, it will help your children relieve stress as well, which makes parenting them a much easier and pleasant experience.
- Partake in a hobby or mission. It’s important for us to do things we enjoy in the margins of our time. There’s satisfaction in creating things, especially for us mamas. Personally, I love crafts, cooking and gardening. I love that I can have my children around me while I’m doing them. I also love when they are curious and want to learn about my hobbies. I enjoy crocheting, and my second born daughter has picked it up. She makes clothing for her stuffies. My son loves cooking and baking with me, especially if he’s had a bad day. My oldest helps me with the garden much of the time, saying that there’s something about being outside and doing quiet tasks that just makes her feel good. I love when people adore the blanket I made for them, taste my food and don’t speak, and my kids run outside to pick and eat fresh raspberries that we grew in our own garden.
- Lean into your life. This tip will take awhile to feel the reduction in stress. This is a shift in mentality. You know when you’re trying to get your child to sleep, and you’re thinking about all the things you’re going to do when they finally pass out, and when you think your kiddo is finally dreaming, you try to leave the room, and they suddenly wake up, and you’re exasperated because you feel like they won’t let you do anything? Yes, this is a frustrating experience, but if you find yourself going through this night after night, I might suggest that you’re not leaning into your life as a mother. Unfortunately, this stage of your child’s life happens. It’s out of your control. They are not at the point of development where they understand that they are safe to sleep. The dark is scary, and so is being away from mom. Shifting your frame of mind to understanding this, and acting accordingly, will help reduce stress. As Oprah Winfrey has said, “You CAN have it all, just not at the same time.” We can absolutely have our children, provide them with their needs, and fill our own cup. It’s just not going to happen all at the same time, or in the way we want it to.
- Forget about societal expectations. As mothers, we hear it all the time. “Your baby should be sleeping through the night by this age,” “Your child should be reading by this age,” “You should be back at work by the time your kids are school age at the latest,” “Why are you still nursing your toddler?,” and it goes on and on and on. While I understand the good intention and reason behind these expectations, it gets so incredibly overwhelming, having to worry about whether you, your family, and your children will fit the societal boxes. The truth is, there’s no need for your family to be “in line” with the others. As long as your children and you and your husband are not harmed in any way, let the children be children, raise them as you believe is best, and don’t mind those who care so much about your life that they feel the need to create the standards for you. Drop their expectations, and don’t ponder them.
A quick note on mindset
Again, this is not an article for weight loss. These are tips to aid your health and fitness and help you look and feel good. However, if you are overweight, you may find that you lose some weight and generally keep it off. These tips are meant to be used 100% of the time. They are meant to become lifestyle habits that keep you feeling great as you do the most meaningful job in the world: momming. But, because of the nature of your life, it’s a good idea to take these tips on gradually, working on one or two at a time, and adding another after mastering the initial tips about 80% of the time.
If you’re trying to lose weight because you don’t like how you look, take a moment with me right now; do not punish yourself for how you look. When you head into your next workout, do not tell yourself that you’re fat and ugly and need to workout to not look like that anymore. Instead, try looking at this as a point of self love. You workout because you love your body and know it’s good for you to challenge it with some strength training, or that it’s good for your body to go for a walk. You love your body, so you feed it what it needs to maintain strength and health.
All of these health and fitness tips are forms of self love. When you do them, you should feel better! Of course, there is always a time and place for foods that may not fit your regular diet. Consistency is key. No one ever got fat from eating a pizza here and there, just like no one got skinny eating a salad once in awhile. Results happen because consistency happens.
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