My Take on Chilhood Obeisity

First of all, I don't want you to misunderstand what I'm saying here. I'm not trying to tell you that you're wrong for having a career and kids at the same time. My purpose is just to make an observation about where our society has gone over the years and the affects it has had on our children.

Secondly, I don't disagree that our children eat too much junk, and our society needs to be better educated on what healthy eating habits look like. I'm all for the elimination of trans fat. All this is good, but I don't think it gets at the root of the problem.

When I was growing up in the '70's and '80's most of the mother's, at least in my neighborhood, stayed at home with their kids. This meant that their were always kids around in the neighborhood. We spend hours upon hours in the summer and after school climbing trees, and playing every game under the sun, from freeze tag to red rover. We came in at night dirty and dog tired. I remember my dad always telling me how proud I should be for the bruises on my legs because it meant I was active.

We didn't play organized sports until we got older, but these neighborhood games are where I learned to play football, soccer, kickball, and most importantly, learned that I could run... and loved it. We didn't just play three times a week for an hour a day like kids today do when they go to soccer practice, we played all the time. We didn't have time to sit in front of the television, and we burned enough calories that we didn't see the immediate detrimental affects of a little junk food.

Now I realize that it would be nearly impossible to go back to times like this. I think it's great that we are becoming more aware of what we put in our food and our bodies, but I don't think we should pretend that controlling everything our kids eat will significantly reduce childhood obesity. It think we need to give our kids time to really play so that working out isn't work, it's just part of having fun and being a kid.

My Perfect Pit Crew

It's sometime after midnight, and my bike isn't working. I'm supposed to meet someone who I've only met via the triathlon club forum for a two hour and forty five minute bike ride tomorrow morning and I need a new right shifter. My pit crew a.k.a. my husband works hard and cheap. Not only is he sacrificing his sleep and anything else he could get on this Valentine's Day night to stay up and fix my bike, but he's sacrificed the shifter from his own bike and put it on my bike so that I can go for my ride in the morning. That's what Valentine's Day is all about for a triathlete. He's speaking my love language. He is constantly willing to forgo his own workouts, bike parts, etc. so that I can get my workout in. My pit crew, I mean husband, is perfect for me.

Early Morning Workouts Don't Take Up Quality Time, or Do They?

I started working out in the early morning hours when I began running again after my kids were born. Six in the morning was a time without excuses. My husband wouldn't be late getting home from work, I wouldn't be starving for dinner, and I wouldn't have any conflicts with other family activities. More importantly, I wouldn't have guilt because my whole family would be sound asleep as I sneaked out of the house. They wouldn't even know I was gone except for the way I would smell in the morning when they woke up to give those good morning hugs.

It's been nine years now since I started those early morning runs, and those runs have grown to include many early morning bike rides as well as swims. I still find that I enjoy my workouts more in the morning because I can do them free from feeling like I'm supposed to be somewhere else. It feels like time that doesn't really count. However, sometimes I do find myself wondering if I'm fooling myself.

Although my family may not realize that I've been gone in the morning, they do notice that I got up early when I tuck them in at night. You see, I start out by walking into my children's' rooms with intentions of having a nice bedside conversation. All the parenting books say that this is the time your kids are most likely to open up to you and share their thoughts. I sit on the edge of the nice, cozy bed and decide that it would be a real bonding time if I just lied down and had some snuggle time with my daughter. After all, how often do we get to do that anymore? Before I can even start the evening prayers she is telling me about her day, and I'm fighting to keep my lids from slamming shut. Then within seconds drool is spilling out onto her pillow and I am uttering comments to her chatter that make absolutely no sense! The only thing that saves me is that the kids think these comments are hysterically funny.

My early workouts have also affected my relationship with my husband. Our movie dates now consist, with few exceptions, of me putting my head on his lap about a quarter of the way into the movie and falling sound asleep. He has stopped getting mad at me for this and has come to accept it as part of our relationship. I can't even seem to stay awake in the movie theater any more. This problem can be embarrassing depending who I'm sitting next to, and can cause a lot of neck discomfort for my morning swim the next day.

I keep saying that I'm going to get to bed earlier. My goal is nine o'clock, but that is almost laughable. I don't usually have the dinner dishes finished by then. The kids would have to put me to bed. (I guess that is what they do anyway, except that I wake up to finish the dishes.) The real problem is that my husband doesn't usually get up by six, so night time is his most productive time and the time he likes to spend with me (awake), so I try to stay awake to get the most quality time with him. After my little "nap" with the kids I can often muster up enough energy so that we can have a nice evening together, usually retiring around eleven.

I often wonder if I was able to get more sleep, would I be less grouchy at night? Would those bedtime conversations give me more insight into my kids' days? Would my quality time with my husband be even better? Maybe, but how would I get my workouts in without the guilt? This is the conundrum of the mother triathlete.