Pack a punch for happy hormones

Hectic schedules leave very little time for women to workout but a simple routine can help you kick in happy hormones, writes Dr Sharmilee Agrawal Kapur

With a day that begins with an alarm clock, racing against time to get children ready for school, packing lunch boxes, rushing to work or staying and scheduling the household chores… all this concluding in coming back to preparing dinner, children’s homework and school updates right to tucking them to sleep… until the next day’s alarm rings… a mother seldom gets time to relax, let alone carve out a designated routine for that much-needed workout! But while dealing with stress and work overloads, mothers need a simple workout routine to kick in those happy hormones.

Stretches

This is crucial for the on-the-go mom. These can be done through the day and should be started on even as you are waiting for that tea/coffee to boil in the morning and you can continue doing this through the day… for a sedentary kind of day, you absolutely should do this… let the muscles breathe and open up.

Functional exercises

By pure definition, these exercises are the ones needed to make us strong so we conduct our day-to-day functions without injury, like bending and picking up a book (we strengthen and practice the hip hinges for this) or even when we need to go from sitting to walking (we strengthen our lower back and quads through lunges and planks), etc.

Meditation & breathing exercises

If you are a mother without stress then you are obviously not giving the job your everything… but jokes apart, all women, need to take a long breath, pace down and take a moment to set that heartbeat right; the age-old pranayama meditation or any sort of controlled breathing will do wonders for stress reduction, and really tone the mind… and a happy by-product of all this is anti-ageing!

Dance therapy

Girls just wanna have fun? Ah, yes we do! Every once in a while, mothers need to dance. Dancing doesn’t just produce those happy hormones… imagine you then passing on all this amazing energy onto your families… dancing will always make your heart and your body happy.

(The author is founder-director, Atmantan Wellness Centre)