Did you know last week was National Healthy Weight Week? To celebrate here are some tips to support healthy weight and body image in young girls and women!

Today’s culture can be a difficult one for girls and women to be in when it comes to weight. There is so much pressure to be a certain weight; while it used to be skinny, now, there is a big push for “healthy weight,” but what does that even mean? The internet is truly a double edged sword as it provides us with access to lots of credible information, it also has a lot of incorrect information which unfortunately spreads like wildfire. With so many people selling coaching, shakes, or other weight loss products it can be difficult to navigate as an adult, let alone as a teen. Here are some tips to help support your tween/teen daughter, niece, cousin, student, etc.

• Support and give an example of healthy eating: make sure you demonstrate healthy eating habits to follow. This means eating all meals, not talking badly about yourself when you eat something that’s not super healthy, discussing food as fuel and how important fuel is for our bodies, etc. Kids and teens learn a lot of behaviors and attitudes from the adults around them, so be sure you are setting a healthy example.
• Encourage regular exercise, but make sure you aren’t equating exercise to value: exercise is a great way to maintain healthy weight and a healthy lifestyle. But it is important to not become hyper focused on it. It can be easy, especially with social media, to think you HAVE to workout and if you don’t you’re a bad person. So encouraging a healthy relationship with working out is crucial.
• Focus on other amazing attributes as well: making sure to compliment other aspects is so important. Some great examples to focus on: kindness, caring, thoughtfulness, helpfulness, etc. These are traits that are completely in their control and not related to body image. Another way is to kind of spin body image compliments, so instead of saying ‘you look so skinny’ you can say ‘you look so healthy’ or ‘you’re glowing when you’re happy’ to focus less on looks and more on attitude.

At the end of the day being healthy is not the same as being skinny or super muscular or anything related to looks. Reminding and encouraging this mindset is key to help young girls have a sense of healthy weight and body image. In today’s world it can be so hard to have a healthy mindset around these topics with social media, and while you can’t control what the young girls in your life are thinking, you can help set a good example for them daily. 

by Katherine Maloney, PT, DPT

January is officially National Bath Safety Month! We figured what better excuse to bring you some tips for safety, positioning, and, of course, fun! 

Bath safety is really important, and so it’s good to have a few reminders to stay on top of safety during bath time. Did you know that as little as 1 inch of water can be hazardous for babies according to the Nationwide Children’s Hospital. But bath time should be a fun, regular activity! Remember: 

• Always supervise children
• Always check water temp with a temperature sensing toy or your wrist
• Set water heaters to 120 degrees Fahrenheit to prevent accidental scalding
• Put no-slip mats in your tub
• Keep any hazardous materials (cleaners, razors, etc) safely stored where children cannot reach them
• Consider taking a CPR/First Aid class for emergencies

Positioning for bath time can not only help with safety but make bath time easier and more enjoyable for you and your kiddos. One tip I learned from Joni was to put a laundry basket (the plastic kind with holes) in the tub for toddlers; this creates a smaller area for them to be in, making it easier to watch them, yet still allows them to play in the water. For infants there are plenty of bath seats available for use in the sink or tub, just remember to make sure your baby is seated upright properly in these for safety!

Finally, here are some tips to make bath time fun for all ages!

• Bring everyday toys in the bath: legos, cars, beach toys, and gardening tools are all great in the bath and open up lots of imagination play for your kid
• Create a water wall: using funnels, water bottles with holes, tubes, and anything else you can think of to build a “track” for the water to flow down the wall of the bath. This really encourages building and engineering skills in a fun way!
• Fishing: get some toy fish, put them in a small round laundry basket, and let your kids go fishing with a net or just their hands! One twist from this that I’ve seen online is to freeze the toys in ice cubes first to make it “ice fishing”!
• Target Practice: use bath letters, or magnets of any kind, stick them to the wall of the bath and fill a spray bottle with water (bonus: you can dye the color with food dye for more fun!). Then just let your kid try to shoot each target with the spray bottle. You can make it more complex for older kids by having them spell out words! I’ve also seen people place coffee filters over the target so the kid can see the filter getting wet from their spray bottle. Either way this is a fun game that also works hand-eye coordination!