If you want to improve your family health, there are many ways of doing it. Perhaps all of you are already getting more exercise, and you might have changed your eating habits to include more fruit and vegetables, and fewer sweets and ready meals.
What else can you do to
improve the health of your family?
Here are 5 tips:
1. Spend more time with your family, whether it's playing games with the children, watching a film, cooking, going to the park, going swimming, or going to a sporting event. By doing things as a family, each family member will feel loved, involved, and will have a chance to speak, and get their opinions across.
2. Listen to your body. If you're tired, have an early night, or if you're unwell, don't be a martyr. There's nothing wrong with admitting that you're unwell, or that you're tired. Don't keep going to the gym if you're under the weather, as it might do you more harm than good. Your children are likely to want to follow your examples, so if you burn the candle at both ends, they are likely to want to as well, especially teenagers.
3. Children often don't say what they mean, perhaps because they haven't always got the vocabulary to do so. Perhaps a tummy ache isn't really a tummy ache, it might be that your child doesn't want to go to school for a number of reasons. By spending more time with your children, you will learn more about them, what makes them upset, and know when they are genuinely unwell.
4. Don't believe everything you read about health. It seems like there are several stories a day regarding health scares, and things you should or shouldn't eat, and things that you should or shouldn't do. Some of these stores will be more applicable than others, and so you should exercise caution, and make your own mind up.
Whilst reports, research and guidelines can be helpful, it may be that the news stories won't affect you, and you won't need to change you lifestyles.
5. Why not encourage each family member to take up a hobby, or spend more time on their existing hobbies? Perhaps you've always wanted to play a musical instrument, or learn a foreign language, or try a new sport? By encouraging your children to try something different, you can help them to learn new skills, and help them to make new friends. These experiences can stand them in good stead later in life.
