Stay-at-Home Weight Change Factor #1: Our main source of calorie burn, our NEAT, disappeared overnight.
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One day, we had a normal life and routine; we commuted, shopped for groceries, went to the gym, picked up our kids from school or daycare, maybe took them to sports or music lessons, cooked meals, cleaned the house, walked the dogs.
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All these things, even the trivial, required moving our bodies.
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The next day, we worked from home, stayed at home, shopped from home, did schoolwork with our kids at the table, and stayed inside our houses.
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Before the stay at home orders went into effect, we had naturally occurring, non-exercise built-in calorie burning activities that we unconsciously did all day long most days of the week.
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We call this total this ‘NEAT’: non-exercise activity thermogenesis (aka: calorie burning)
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And then...we started barely moving at all.
Even if we kept up with working out, we still didn’t move nearly as much throughout the day as we did before.
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Decreased overall calorie burn each day can, if partnered with no change in how much we eat (or even eating more than before), lead to a slow creep of weight gain.
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But if we recognize that moving less than we used to is a factor, then we’re armed with a good counter-strategy for stopping ‘the creep’ from continuing!
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**If loss of daily movement due to the stay at home order is a factor for you, try these strategies:
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•Take more walks each day
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•Set your timer to remind you to get up and move once an hour: do squats or push ups or lunges or step ups on your chair for 5 minutes
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•Move during every commercial when watching tv
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•Stand during webinars or zoom calls
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•If you have stairs, go up and down them more
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•Do more housework (yeah, I know super fun)
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•Find ways to ‘sneak in’ more basic movement each day to help build up your NEAT
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•Compete with your kids: walk sits, push ups, handstand holds, do crawling contests, race them, or whatever gets you both going
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Bottom line: Reinvent Your Day.
Restore movement into your daily life.
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When move more, then we burn more!
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Need more ideas or support? Reach out!
We're in it together...all the way.