I thought being a resident
physician was challenging.
Then came parenthood.
I’m on maternity leave after the birth of my son. I have to say, it’s harder than residency. It’s a 24/7 job with my beloved Demandy Andy at the centre. I’ll certainly have more to say about life as a new mom in upcoming posts, especially since I’m going back to work in exactly a month.
(AH!)
But for now, I want to talk about my current exercise routine.
My Exercise Routine Criteria
I have specific criteria that I thought out for my exercise routine. This one meets all of them: it fits into my day in between caring for an infant, it has a low barrier to entry (meaning I can do it at home anytime, usually in my pj’s), and I can see progress with my workouts. As always with my workout routines, I have a lot of flexibility and rest built right in.
Weightlifting
My main focus is on weight training. If I had to specify a style of weight training, I’d say it’s closest to bodybuilding. I do full body workouts, 3 times a week. For each exercise, I do 2-3 sets, and 8-15 repetitions.
About 8 years ago, my husband and I invested in home gym equipment. Our setup is simple but effective with a bench, barbell, pull-up bar, and free weights. We fortunately bought it all years before COVID made the price of home gym equipment skyrocket.
I used to do about an hour of weightlifting 4-5 times a week in our little gym. Times have changed. Now, my sessions take 15 minutes. However, I’m still seeing progress.
With my total of 45 minutes of weightlifting per week, I’m still increasing the number of repetitions or the weight I use. I use a free workout tracking app so that I can keep challenging myself to do more or lift heavier.
Since my workouts are short, I keep them intense. I pick exercises that work multiple muscle groups at once, called compound exercises. I do supersets, meaning I’ll do different exercises back-to-back instead of resting between each set. And I get up to 2 RIR (repetitions in reserve), which means I do enough repetitions until I’m only 2 repetitions away from failure.
Walking
Outside of weightlifting, I love walking. I have two dogs, as you can see in the picture. My favourite thing is to go on a family walk with all 5 of us.
Since I enjoy walking, I don’t mind getting 10,000 steps a day. I do this in any way that I want. Sometimes I go for a long hike. Often, I go for multiple shorter walks in the day. Sometimes I find a walking workout on YouTube when the weather is bad. And occasionally I don’t hit 10,000 steps, and that’s totally okay.
What else though? What about interval training, or running, or stretching, or all the other things that I’ve heard are good for me?
While I’ve tried many types of exercise in the past, I’ve settled on walking and weightlifting for now. I used to feel guilty that I wasn’t doing a more intense form of cardio. But the best exercise is the one you can stick to.
(If you’re doing any amount of physical activity, please don’t let others make you feel guilty about how you should be doing more. Being more active in the long run comes from a place of loving your body, not from guilt induced by someone else.)
I may add in some interval training or yoga in the future. But for now, I’m thoroughly enjoying my current exercise routine.
Stay healthy friends,
-Dr. Kuhnow
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