Image by danedeasy via Flickr

Would you?

I would. At least I think I might start.

Let me explain.

We were at Panera for dinner and our 7yo son, after he had eaten his fair share of chicken noodle soup, sandwich, and yogurt, asked if he could have dessert. The rest of us were still eating, so I fished out a $5 bill and then he went up with my wife to buy his choice. A few minutes later, he marched proudly back, carrying a huge cinnamon roll and $2.51 in change.

Normally we would pay for the desserts using a credit card along with the rest of the food. But this time, seeing the cash really brought home the value of one cinnamon roll. Two dollars and forty nine cents! That’s a lot!! Granted, it was a big one, but its size just served to underscore how inflated (and wasteful) all of this really was. The cinnamon roll was more than he really needed, and $2.49 was more than it should really cost.

So I asked him a question. I asked him if he had the option to take the two dollars and fifty cents and either buy a cinnamon roll or keep the money, what would he do? After all, either way I end up spending the money anyway.

He said he’d keep the money and skip dessert.

Now, we’ve been paying our kids a weekly allowance for a while, and our rule is that when we go to Target or anywhere else, instead of begging us for toys or any other random item they may want on a whim, they can buy whatever they want (as long as it is appropriate) with their own allowance money. Because of this, our kids now know what $3 will buy, what $5 will buy, and what $10 will buy. They know that for the bigger, better toys, they need to save for a few weeks. They get to make their own decisions and take responsibility for those decisions, instead of all the control and decision responsibility being with us (making us the bad guys every time we say no).

I wondered if the same concept could work with desserts.

My seven year old, the one who said he’d skip dessert and keep the money, is a dessert fiend. He would eat sweets constantly all day if he could. This kid lives for dessert.

So lately, enforcing good nutrition has felt more and more like a battle with him. He’s always trying to see how little “real” food and how much dessert he can get away with. And we’re always reminding him that he needs to make healthful choices.

But what’s his motivation? Dessert is coming anyway, and Mommy and Daddy are always providing it. Any occasions where he has to skip dessert are occasions when Mommy or Daddy are being the bad guys and making the decision for him. And then it’s no longer about living and eating healthfully — it’s about us being mean to him and what little educational value there might have been in the discussion is suddenly lost.

And when you look at the long range consequences of that, how are we preparing him to make good food choices independently? If we always tell him what to eat and what not to eat, how will he ever learn to make his own decisions later when he’s on his own? Maybe we’ve just been raising a monster — one that will go out and buy sweets every chance he gets when he’s on his own to make up for all the sweets that his parents had deprived him of.

And this is where I had my big epiphany.

Why not let him start making the choices now?

Of course if we just ask him whether he wants dessert or not, he’ll always say that he wants dessert — as long as we’re buying.

But once he has the choice of getting the dessert or getting the money, now he has to think about what that dessert is worth to him. Yes, it will taste really yummy right now, but with $2.50 he could buy two Hot Wheels or a pack of Silly Bandz. Or, he could skip a few desserts and get a new stuffed animal or maybe even a Beyblade! Now instead of a hollow choice of sweets or no sweets, a whole new world of possibilities opens up for him.

The point is, the choice is his. He can learn that desserts don’t just magically appear. They have value, and their value can be understood in relation to other things. And he can finally decide for himself that perhaps he doesn’t really need that humongous cinnamon roll.

It’s a far cry from making decisions based on nutritional value and health and other adult concepts, which are vitally important but aren’t real to a seven year old — but I think it’s a step in the right direction.

What about you?

An old friend of mine from high school who has a successful psychiatry practice in upstate New York recently published a blog post on addiction that got me thinking… What is the tipping point at which something is no longer a hobby, an interest, or even a way of life – but becomes an addiction?

Can one be addicted to running?

Dr. Ferraioli points out in his post that addictions “…DISCONNECT us from ourselves and from our real lives; and that includes the people in our lives such as our children, our spouses, our friends, and our communities, among others.”

Many of us use running to escape. For me, it’s a brief period in the day where I can clear my head and find respite from everything else that’s going on. And I think that’s a very healthy thing. Everyone needs time to “recenter” and many of us find that time running.

But can you take it too far?

As with anything else in life, the key to success is balance. Ask yourself, does your running strengthen your family relationships or strain them? Is your family included in your running goals, or does your running make your family feel excluded? Does running bring you closer to the ones you love, or does it disconnect you?

If you find yourself on the wrong side of the balance, now is the time to take action. Talk to your family. Include them. Listen to them. Value them. And then take another look at your training plan and make sure that it gives you the balance you need. Unless you’re a professional athlete, it’s OK to cut back on your training. It’s OK to not hit a PR every time. It’s OK to give yourself a break for the sake of your family.

My family has had a very busy summer this year. I’ve been lucky to log two runs a week lately, and I’m happy with that.

I hope to run well into my old age, but I know that the day will come when I will no longer be able to run. My joints will be too old and my muscles too weak. I expect that when that day comes I will not regret a single missed run, failed training plan, unshed pound, or cancelled race. Instead, I will cherish the extra time I got to spend with my family, and hope that we grew to be a stronger family because of it.

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair…”

From A Tale of Two Cities, by Charles Dickens

Over the last two weekends, my kids ran two different fun runs. (That’s my youngest in the photo)

One was sponsored and coordinated by the local hospital, with the goal of promoting health and fitness. The other was sponsored and promoted by a school, with the goal of raising funds for the financial aid fund.

One had post-race entertainment consisting of healthy homemade foods, a variety of physical activities, and a live band playing kids’ music. The other had a free can of soda pop for each kid that ran.

Pop Can Fun Run

The Pop Can Fun Run drew hundreds of local kids between the ages of 2 and 10 to have fun and promote health and fitness. The race was run in heats by age (2 year old race, 3 year old race, etc.). The 2 through 4 year olds ran down the block about 0.1 miles. The 5 through 10 year olds ran down the block and back, about 0.2 miles. Boys and girls ran in separate heats, and it was especially great to see so many girls at the race! (The photo above is the start of the 5 year old girls race)

Yet, with all its potential, the Pop Can Fun Run left a bad taste in my mouth. Despite the event being sponsored and run by the local hospital, right next to the hospital, to supposedly promote health and fitness, each participant (including the 2 year olds) could claim their own can of soda pop after they ran.

Pop Can Fun Run finisher’s tent

Something just doesn’t sit right with me when a hospital hands out free sodas to kids. Yes, they did need to run for it. But is that what we’ve come to? We need to bribe our kids with soda to get them to come out to a race?

“I’d do anything for a soda — I’d even run!”

I should expect higher standards from a hospital, and yet somehow I’m not surprised. What a great event for educating the public! Yet there were no nutrition pamphlets or advice to be seen, no nurses talking to families about how to keep their kids healthy, and no displays or activities promoting fitness. Wasting such a golden opportunity for public health education would have been bad enough, but handing out free soda to kids took the cake.

For more on why I think handing out sodas to kids is such a bad idea, check out my previous post on the scary truth about sugar for runners.

CVMS 5K and 1 Mile Family Fun Run

Although not as well attended as the Pop Can Fun Run, the CVMS 5K and 1 Mile Family Fun Run (which drew less than 200 participants across both events) was outstanding! Sponsored by the Chemung Valley Montessori School, the purpose of this event was “to help our students, families, and communities focus on the benefits and fun of fitness while fundraising and supporting those in need.”

Both the 5K and 1 Mile events were kid-friendly — and in many cases entire families ran together. The entire 1 mile course, and the majority of the 5K course, went out and back on a rail trail (pictured below). Some kids ran the whole way. Some ran and walked. Some stopped to pick flowers or look for birds in the marshland adjacent to the trail.

CVMS 1 Mile Family Fun Run

After the race, kids and families were welcomed onto the school playground to enjoy homemade food including (but not limited to) a variety of fresh fruits, hummus, pasta salad, and granola bars. An inflatable was set up next to the kids’ band so the children could bounce away what energy they had left after running while the band played kid-friendly music like “Cheese Man”.

All in all it was a fabulous family event — just what a family fun run should be.

So what do you think? Am I being too hard on the hospital? Chime in with your comments below!

Losing focus on your running goals?

How are you doing with your running and fitness goals? How is the rest of your family doing?

As the Holidays pass and we become re-absorbed into the activities of our daily lives, it gets easier and easier to find excuses — especially at this time of year. It’s too cold to run outside … It’s too dark to run in the morning … It’s too dark to run in the evening … I’m getting tired of the treadmill and wish I could just run outside … I’ll just skip today … I’ll get back on track tomorrow …

Publish your running goals and keep track

One of the best ways to make sure you don’t slack off is to publish your running and fitness goals and track your progress. It doesn’t have to be complicated. One technique is to just post your goal in big letters on the fridge or the family bulletin board — DADDY WILL RUN 3 TIMES A WEEK. Then keep a log sheet handy and write down each time you complete a workout or otherwise make progress towards your goal.

You can also use some great online tools to make your goals public.

• Daytum.com is a simple and attractive site where you can post goals and track metrics for free. This is the site I’m using to aggregate and track my Run 48 States progress. Create your page in a few minutes, then post it on Facebook, Twitter, or email it to friends that you know will keep you honest.
• MapMyRun.com (affiliate link) is a comprehensive site that lets you log workouts, publish them to your Facebook and Twitter accounts automatically, and view metrics in a variety of different ways. Better yet, if you get your running friends on it as well, you can link your profiles and see what your friends have been doing to keep each other honest.
• Runkeeper.com is another online option that is a bit more streamlined than MapMyRun. It has less functionality, but is much easier to use and is better designed. You input your workouts on your iPhone (support for other devices coming in the future) through the RunKeeper app available through the App Store for free. RunKeeper then charts your progress both on your iPhone, and on their website. It integrates nicely with the GPS capabilities of the iPhone, plotting your course on a map during your run and providing statistics for distance and pace. It also integrates nicely with Facebook and Twitter, and allows you to build a network of running buddies called your “Street Team.”

There are plenty more out there. These are just the ones I’ve used. If you have a great suggestion, let us know about it by leaving a comment!

Rely on your family for support

Believe it or not, your family wants you to be successful in your running and fitness goals. Think about how you feel about them. Don’t you want your spouse to be healthy? Don’t you want to help your spouse find time to work out? Don’t you want your kids to be healthy and to realize their goals? Well your family wants that for you too.

You should have shared your fitness goals with your family when you set them. If you didn’t, share them now. OK, maybe not right now, but do it today. Make sure your family knows what you’re trying to achieve, and that they understand why.

Then ask them for help. If you are starting to find yourself struggling to keep up with your commitments to yourself, tell them what your challenges are. While you’re at it, don’t make it all about you. Ask them how they’re doing on their fitness goals. Work together as a family, as a team, to really understand what each of you wants to achieve — and then support each other and help each other be successful.

Working together and keeping your lines of communication open helps your entire family support each other. You can celebrate each other’s successes. You can help each other deal with challenges as they come up. You can use your running and fitness goals to bring your family together, and keep each other on track.

This week’s Sunday USA Weekend newspaper insert contained a brief article entitled “How to sneak fitness into your children’s lives” (online version here), highlighting a book by Larysa Didio called Sneaky Fitness: Fun, Foolproof Ways to Slip Fitness into Your Child’s Everyday Life.

For some reason, the article troubled me as I was reading it, and I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. After all, anything espousing fitness for kids has to be good, right?

And then I figured out what was bugging me so much.

Family fitness is not something you should “sneak” in

Family fitness is not the same as hiding the dog’s medicine in his dogfood. It’s not something that’s supposed to be good for you, yet so unpalatable that you need to sneak it in.

Somehow, deceiving our children holds a strange attraction on parents. From Santa, to the Easter Bunny, to the Tooth Fairy — tricking our kids has become part of our parental culture.

One day my kids used a kit to make little colorful martians out of gel. When they weren’t looking, the martians disappeared because “their spaceship took off!” For the next half hour, I would make the martians keep reappearing somewhere else in the house when the kids were looking the other direction so that they could be rediscovered to squeals of delight moments later. The kids had fun with it. We had fun with it. But I don’t think our kids will grow up into adults who believe that little martians really did fly around our house that day.

I also don’t think that parents expect their kids to grow up believing in Santa, or the Easter Bunny, or Leprechauns, or all the other cute little pranks we play on our innocent children. So if we expect our kids to figure out our subterfuge as they mature and grow out of it, then why would they not also “grow out of” our fitness subterfuge?

If the only way you can get your kids to stay fit is by sneaking exercise into their lives, what happens when they grow up and move out? Parents should be preparing their kids to live their lives on their own by helping them learn how to make good choices, not by pushing our choices on them through stealth.

Family fitness should be something fun! It should be something you want to do with your kids, and also something that your kids want to do with you. It’s not just about doing it because it’s good for you. It’s about enjoying activities together, and enjoying a healthier lifestyle together.

So how do you make family fitness enjoyable?

On this count, the article pretty much has it right — create fun challenges; give them the tools (although I don’t particularly see how replacing dining-table chairs with fitness balls could possibly end well); and be fit together.

I think the more open you are with your kids about fitness, the more they see you living a healthy lifestyle, and the more you include them in your activities, the more you will all enjoy fitness together.

People are catching on. People want to have fun with their families and they want to have healthy families. Families want to do fun and active things together, and more and more resources are becoming available to help families do just that. (In fact, there’s a great website in my blogroll focused entirely on how to make fitness fun with your family.)

Take a walk with your kids, play tag, go orienteering together, go on a bike ride, go swimming, set up an ad-hoc obstacle course in the backyard. Do anything, just do it together. Your kids will keep begging you for more, and you won’t have to sneak it in.

In all fairness, I haven’t actually read the book in question (and, frankly, am not adding it to my book list after this article), but I ask anyone who has to please comment below with your views. And if you have some creative ideas for including kids in fun and healthy activities, please share them in the comments!