“Mom, can I have some candy since I slept in my bed all night?” “What, its 6:45A.M. no, you can’t have candy right now.” Let the wailing, whining, and stomping commence.

Ever had a conversation like this with your little one? Finding a balance between rewards, treats, motivation and healthy habits is beyond challenging in today’s world. Between ads on TV, YouTube, and grocery store registers lined with sugary treats its hard to gear your little ones towards a healthy lifestyle. I wanted to share with you some tips for setting your kids up for success and lifelong health.

Do What I Do

Guys the number one tip that’ll you’ll hear from every outlet is kids will do what you do. If you yourself model healthy habits your kids will follow. Creating lifelong healthy habits is about what you do on a consistent basis. My best healthy consistent habit is water intake! I love water and have no problem drinking it regularly. My daughter sees this and regularly requests water. She also asks for juice but has no problem being given water to drink throughout the day, at bedtime and with snacks.

Talk about the benefits

Even as adults we often need to be “sold” on the idea of something before committing. Before I do something, I want to know the why behind it and kids are the same way. When implementing a new healthy lifestyle choice its important to talk about the why. Even if its not a new choice and maybe just one that you’re receiving pushback on (hey bedtime, I’m looking at you) discussing the why will help. Phrasing it like we do this _____ because it helps us do this _______. An example would be we go to sleep at this time because sleep helps our body grow, fix things, and get ready for a full day of play. When we sleep our body and brain have time to rest so that we can feel good and ready for the next day.

Help Them Find an Activity they Love

I hate HIT workouts, training, and anything remotely close to it. If that was the only activity you gave me I would never be active because I can’t get into it. Kids are the same they have their own preferences on what they like so helping them find something active they like to do is important. It doesn’t have to be sports based like soccer, basketball or whatever. It can be nature walks to pick flowers, puddle jumping, scavenger hunts, dance parties or jumping rope. If you kid loves music have a dance party to their favorite songs for 10-15 minutes a day. If they are into video games, there are tons of those active video games available they can play.

Movement is movement, whether you are outside or inside it’s the effort that counts. My little one is so into jumping rope but at the young age of 3 cannot jump rope to save her life. Instead, we practice jumping and pretending to jump rope to get us moving. Anything that grabs their attention for even a short period of time! Here is the thing with movement, your body becomes addicted to it in a sense, this isn’t just for adults it’s for kids too! There are a lot of studies that have found exercise increases the release of endorphins that help you feel good!

Don’t withhold treats or force activity

If you are going to create lifelong healthy habits, then you must teach self-regulation around food and exercise. As adults we have days where we feel super motivated and others where we can’t bring ourselves to get active. This is normal and teaching a mindset around listening to our bodies and respecting them will help kids learn to listen to their own body. If my body is telling me I am tired its important for me to listen and rest that day. If my body is telling me it’s tired everyday (I feel ya) then I may need to examine why that is and make some changes.  The same goes with food. Only having treats once a month or every other can feel restrictive. Instead, giving kids a small treat on a more regular basis teaches them the mindset that its ok to have sweets in moderation.

Keep it Positive

This can be a hard one to do especially if you aren’t mindful about the way, you say things. Speaking about food, our bodies and others needs to come from a positive place. Saying things like those sweets will rot your teeth or make you fat can create an unhealthy relationship and mindset about food. Instead talking about what food does for out body.

Saying something like food gives us energy, sweets can give us a lot of energy, but it doesn’t last long and can make us tired soon after, where as an apple gives us lots of energy and that energy lasts for a long time. Apples also help our body grow, give us vitamins to have nice skin and nails. Sweets are super yummy, but they do not give our body things to help us so its important to eat lots of other healthy foods too. 

Speaking negatively about yourself or treats can create the idea that we are bad or certain foods are bad which can lead to restriction/binging cycles, eating disorders or shame around food choices. Regular conversations about why we have sweets sometimes and choose healthy foods a lot of the time is key.

Create Healthy Swaps Together

There is a lot of junk food in our world today and something I find joy in is creating healthy swaps for some of my favorite treats. When you make something that you like, is good food you it’s a great feeling. I look for healthy swaps all the time and constantly try them out. Sometimes they are awesome and become a staple and other times they are a total flop but a good experience. Start by choosing one of your favorite sweet treats and then google a healthy version.

For example, I love strawberry milk shakes, so I googled no-added sugar strawberry milkshake or healthy strawberry milkshake. I ended up finding one that is so good I don’t even miss the real deal! Doing this together will also start to help your child to see they have a choice and it’ll empower them to be able to create their own special treats.

Have Fun and Be Flexible

Honestly this is the biggest parenting tip for any area. If you’re trying to create healthy lifelong habits in your kids and they aren’t having fun, it won’t stick. Find things that they enjoy and get excited about. Try new things often and don’t be surprised when, as kids do, they change their mind on something they like. Just keep working to instill those healthy habits movement, self-love and moderation.

What is your favorite way to move with your kids or yourself? I am lucky that my oldest loves yoga just like me! The attention span for length isn’t quite there but we have fun getting our mats out together and making up silly fun flows and poses.