Achieving a work-life balance for working moms is a real struggle. In addition to all other demands besides work, exercise and general personal care seem to take a back seat for most moms.
The main challenge for working moms is actually how to schedule the exercise into their routine. As a working mom, how do you fit exercise into your schedule? Seems difficult huh?
This post has 7 top guaranteed and proven tips to follow as a guide to successfully incorporate exercise into your working-mom day routine.
In this post;
Why Is Exercise Necessary For Working Moms?
How to Successfully Fit Exercise into your Routine
Different Ways of Fitting Exercise into a working mom schedule
Top Tips on Exercise Scheduling for Working Moms
Reasons Why Exercise is Beneficial & Necessary For Full Time Working Moms
The exercise is so necessary or beneficial to a working mom for the following reasons;
1. Exercise Helps Working Moms Lose Weight
Working moms see the benefit of exercising because of the need to lose weight. Postpartum weight is especially a major challenge to many women. Exercise is hence crucial for working moms who are returning work from maternity leave and need to fit to lose weight.
2. Exercise Benefits Working Moms with Self-care
Exercise is crucial to working moms for personal self-care. Mental health is especially key for a working mom and hence the need to exercise despite having a busy routine or schedule. Itt has been proven that workin moms who exercise regularly have better mental health.
3. Working Moms gets Better and Quality Sleep when they Exercise
Exercise for working moms improves sleep quality. Having adequate sleep and rest is necessary to meet demands of the following day that working moms face everyday. It is one of the benefits that working moms get by incorporating exercise into their daily schedule.
4. Exercise Helps Working Moms in Stress Management
Effective stress management is important for working oms, especially those working full-time. Work and motherhood duties that working moms have can be stressful and straining and therefore exercise can help alleviate this.
It is one of the benefits that working moms who fit exercise into their busy routine experience. enjoy.
5. Exercise Refreshes and Energizes the Body
Exercise is crucial and beneficial to working moms by rejuvenating and boosting their energy. Exercise lowers fatigue and tiredness related to high energy demands in full time working moms.
Read: Exercise Routine Options for Night Shift Working Moms
7 Simple Proven Ways to Successfully Creating an Exercise Routine for Working Moms
1. Make Exercise Part of your Daily Routine/ Tradition
To successfully ingrain exercise into your life, it must become part of your routine. You need to treat exercise same as the other necessary routines you do every day. For instance, taking a shower is a routine for you in the morning and/or in the evening.
Start treating exercise this way too, like something you have to do daily. Choose an exercise and put it as part of your routine.
It’s more of an item on your everyday to-do list. This may include a morning run, gym, or a walk among others. See it as part of what you are required to do daily and you will easily fix exercise into your schedule, even as busy as it is for full time working moms.
Aim to do it at the same time of the day every day because this consistency will help you keep to it.
2. Develop the Right Exercise Mindset
Change your Mindset. Look at exercising as your responsibility. Not to impress others or anything but for your personal benefit. You hence must understand the overall benefits of exercising and relate to them personally. It is after then that you can take exercise as part of caring for yourself.
Without taking care of yourself, you cannot be able to take care of others in your life. To be the best version of yourself, you need exercise. This mindset will be crucial for your motivation when you feel like giving up and you can’t really see the results of your exercising.
You need to keep doing exercise especially even when you feel like you don’t need to keep doing it. For instance, you may think since you have not lost weight you should stop or that now since you have lost weight there is no need for exercise anymore.
Having the right mindset is important to both start and maintain an exercising routine for a full time working mom. It will also help you have the right priorities in other areas of your life such as your diet choices among others.
Read: Importance of SelfCare
3. Find a Motivation Factor for Exercise
The motivation level for exercise varies from one woman to another. Some will keep on exercising while others give up after a month. Look for what motivates you and use it to keep you always interested in following your exercise routine.
If working out together with a friend, group or partner does it for you, then incorporate them into your routine. Join an exercise group if you need to. You can even find yourself an accountability partner that will help you stay on check-in exercise.
If an outdoor environment inspires you to exercise even harder, do so. Whatever it is that fires you up and keeps you exercising, it is it that you need to maintain your exercise routine as a working mom.
Find the fun in it and take up the challenge to do better for yourself every day. Combine it even with something you love doing such as dancing or playing music in the background.
Read: Sources of Motivation for Working Moms
4. Introduce Exercise Moderately into your Rountine
Have you ever wondered how working moms get in shape? By doing it moderately. Unless you are a professional fitness guru, there is no need to go too extensive. Anything over an hour and a half in the GYM is not necessary unless it is your level.
Considering that you are a full time working mom and hence short on time, you need to do your exercise in the time you can afford. It doesn’t have to be 2+ hours in the gym or a 1hr run or anything like that.
Start with 5-10 minutes of bodyweight exercise, yoga, stretching, walking, or something else. Adjust to longer spans when you have longer time such as during the weekends. It will all add up. This way it will be easy to accommodate exercise into your routine as you won’t feel like exercise is a time-waster.
Make your exercise routine so simple and flexible that you can even do it anywhere, even while on holiday. Incorporate squats, lunges, jump rope, stretching which are simple and flexible for any environment and are great ways to exercise while on a busy schedule.
Simple Convenient Times to Fit Exercise into a working Mom Schedule
1. Schedule Early Mornings for Exercise
Working out after work becomes inconvenient and impractical since you have other demands at home such as your kids and house chores. But you can change this if you instead woke up early in the morning to exercise. It is not pleasant but once it is incorporated into your routine you will love it.
An early workout helps is one the easiest time that many working moms find as ideal to fit exercise into their routine. It sets the right mood for the entire day and you will be even more productive.
There are also lesser destructions in the morning and you can focus on yourself which is good for your mental health. Experts have proven that moms who work out in the morning are happier and more productive at work.
You will just need to readjust your sleeping and wake-up time to allow for the early hour waking up time.
Read: Time Management Tips for Working Moms
2. Working Moms can use Late Evenings for Exercise
On the contrary, some working moms can’t get an hour in the morning to work out. This is especially so if your shifts start early or you need a long drive to work. You may wake up early but must leave early and hence not practical at all.
You can still get time to exercise . As an option look into your evening and squeeze an hour for exercise into your daily routine. Evenings are among the most popular time for working moms to exercise simply because of the convenience it offers.
Maybe it’s the hour after job whereby you to the gym. It gives you the energy you need to transition into your evening routine.
If not you can have your exercise before bedtime. This is after you have done any chores you need to do and the kids have retired to bed. This type of workout will help you get good sleep and rest afterward that you kick off the following day.
Read: How to Get “Me Time” as a Working Mom
3. Weekend Workouts are Perfect Time for Exercise for Working Moms
If both morning and evening work out are not possible for you to exercise, you can still use some time during the weekends to exercise. Remember every bit of exercise matters and it all helps for your overall health and well being.
Incorporate an exercise that you love for the sake of motivation. You can also capitalize on the long hours you have over the weekend to do a longer workout on both days.
If you don’t have a child care arrangement, take turns with your partner to watch the baby as the other does exercise. If you work from home, you even have more options to choose a consistent hour during the weekend that is most convenient for you.
Simple Office Exercise for Working Moms
Expert Tips on Creating an Exercise Schedule for Working Moms
1. Start moderately and Improve Daily
Start moderately and improve day by day to make an exercise routine easy. Since you are starting, it is easier and even safer to start moderately and adjust with time. You will need to keep improving on your workouts as you go along every level. The hardest part is setting the routine. It takes a good 3-4wks to form a habit
2. Hire a Professional Trainer
Hire a professional to schedule and train with you on specific days. If you feel you need guided help, then hire a professional trainer for workouts. A personal trainer will help you in mapping out a workout plan that includes workout goals and adjustments when necessary.
Also use an efficient and effective training app for fitting exercise into you daily life. Fitness apps are great in helping you track progress, mark key milestones, and set reminders among others.
Invest in quality equipment, gym wear, etc.
3. Make Exercise Fun
Combine exercise with something you love and is fun to easily make it a tradition that fits into your daily routine. It could be music, TV or dancing to keep you motivated.
You have to want it for it to be worth it. Change your mindset about exercise and it will become easier. It makes all the difference on the days you don’t feel like exercising. The best schedule for working out is the one that works for you as a working mom.
4. Exercise at Work
Take advantage of opportunistic exercises to find time for exercise while at work. These are opportunities that you have throughout the day to get your body working. For instance, you can take the staircase instead of the lift, run to the bus stop, use a standing desk at work, etc. These exercises help you stay fit even on a busy working mom schedule.
5. Get a Support System
Find support for effectively follow scheduled workout when your routine gets busy. Your partner will play a key role in your starting and maintaining exercise. Your partner can be your motivation as well as actually helping out such as watching the baby as you hit the gym.
6. Be Realistic
Set realistic exercise expectations and goals for your body. But be purposeful about fitting exercise into your daily routine.
Remember fitness is a continuous journey. Don’t put too many demands on your body to be achieved in an unrealistic time frame. Be realistic when setting goals to ensure they are achievable. This will avoid getting you demotivated.
Start/join an exercise challenge that motivates you a becomes a workout routine or tradition. Participating in a challenge is a key motivator. You can set key goals and feel good about achieving them. Challenges are good in breaking the monotony of the exercise routine too. The challenge can combine diet and exercise all to a better outcome.
It is not selfish to take the time you need to take care of yourself. Don’t feel guilty about the time you are taking on your exercise. Also, be forgiving to yourself when you miss an exercise.
