How I stay physically active during my journey

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Hey fellow Steemians, thank you for stopping by last week while I showed you my secret weapon to losing unwanted weight. Today, I will talk to you about staying active even during a snow storm. Before I start, I am not a professional trainer or professional health nutritionist so please take the information you read today as part of my experience. It is up to you to use this information or not. I am here to share my experience with you.

Today in New England, we had an ongoing snowstorm which either prevents you from going to work, delays your commute or if you work for the public school system, you’re the lucky one that gets to stay home.

During a snow storm, people usually like to stay indoors and stay warm. I try to stay active by looking at things I need to accomplish for the day. Usually I wake up, make my bed and start my day. I am a routine addict so I like to do the same things at the same time during a work week so I can come to work early or on time.

During the last snow storm, I was able to come to work for half a day. After that, I had to go home because the snow was piling up which will lead to a dangerous commute on the road. When I got home, I switched up my outfit and had my winter gear on.

This is the last winter storm where I was getting ready to shovel and clear the driveway.

According to sparkpeople.com, shoveling burns about “1233 calories for 2.5 hours.”I got this number by using my body weight and multiplying it by the amount of time I shoveled for. Shoveling is a great workout indeed. I went around and shoveled my driveway, the public sidewalk, cleared off the front door steps as well as the side door steps. I could have used my snow blower but what fun would that be when I “needed” the exercise right?

After the shoveling, I came inside and was greeted with some hot tea. @lifeinasatincap (Amelia) was gracious enough to get me something warm to drink and eat. This is considered the best trade off ever because I get to go outside and workout and come in to a warm meal and relax for the day.

On other days where there is no snow, I get on our stepper which has resistance bands attached. Unfortunately, the stepper had overused resistance bands which ended up snapping on my last workout. Talk about working out and over working your equipment huh.

I was able to get around the broken band and attached another resistance band under the device which helped me increase the intensity on my workout. This workout for half an hour was probably helping me burn about 100-200 calories. Not too bad indeed.

Other days, I am using the resistance band to do some workouts that I found on youtube. These workouts are great because they help you work on parts of your body that you normally do not work on. I’ve also done high intensity workouts like Shaun T’s T-25 as well. These work well if you switch up the workout every time. In my experience, my body will stop working as hard if I do the same workout over and over. It is best to switch it up and get your body working differently in order to get results. So far, my weight has been going up and down.

Amelia and I just got a puppy and we are also dog sitting so I haven’t had so much time to work out as much as I would like. I have however been playing with Electra, the dog we are watching for the week. She’s super active and always wants to play so I’ve been taking her out and throwing the Frisbee around which is her favorite activity. Her dad is an active dog agility trainer so he instructed me to keep her on a tight regimen with a strict diet and lots of activities.

Here is Electra ☺

Our puppy Willa Rae is also active for half an hour and usually takes naps after playtime. Her other mom @lifeinasatincap is constantly running after her when she is home and teaching her how to become a fun pup.

Other than shoveling, using some resistance bands, and doing HIIT workouts, I am constantly standing at work using my stand up desk. Although I do not burn so many calories with standing, it is better for my back and it keeps me awake. What are your ways of staying physically active? If you like hearing about my journey, please stay tuned for more posts about my weight loss.

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