A parent’s love for their child is unmatched. As a parent, you want the best for your children, and part of that is wanting them to grow up as happy and as healthy as they can. You want them to feel strong, energized, and confident in their own skin, and you never want to see them get sick.
As a parent, how do you accomplish this seemingly daunting task? The good news is that it’s easier than you think; it doesn’t require massive lifestyle changes, and it doesn’t mean eating spinach for every meal. Here are some ways you can keep your children strong and smiling.
1. Serve Healthy Foods
As you’ve probably heard hundreds of times, it’s important to serve your children healthy meals and snacks. Taste Buds are malleable, especially at a young age, and what you feed your kids when they’re young will make a big difference in what they’ll choose to eat as they grow up. If your kids adopt a terrible diet, it will lead to lots of inflammation in the body and a weakened immune system. Healthy snack ideas include carrots and hummus, apples and peanut butter, cucumber with balsamic, ants on a log, and more.
With that said, it may feel difficult to get all the nutrients your child needs into their body with food. Pairing a balanced diet with vitamins for kids will make a huge difference in their overall health. Vitamins like Vitamin D, Vitamin C, Biotin, Vitamin E, and more can all be productive supplements to add to your child’s diet.
2. Don’t Ban Junk Food
You’ve probably heard the saying, “You always want what you don’t have.” When it comes to children and junk food, this rings true; it may seem counterintuitive, but don’t ban junk food. When you ban junk food, it only makes the cookies, candies, and chips seem more special to your children, increasing desire. In addition, labeling foods as “good” or “bad” could set your children up for a toxic relationship with food later in life. You want your kids to enjoy the healthy stuff and the not-so-healthy stuff, because life is all about balance and moderation.
3. Encourage Exercise
Encouraging exercise when children are young will prevent illness, maintain weight, and increase your children’s happiness levels (yay for endorphins!). Take your kids to the park to run around on nice days and enforce “technology-free time” indoors when the weather isn’t cooperating. If you’re able, it’s always good to run around and exercise with them, as parents are their kids’ biggest role models. What you do, they’ll want to do.
4. Frequently Wash Hands
The rumors are true; washing hands makes a world of a difference in keeping your kids healthy. Make sure your children wash their hands after using the bathroom (obviously), before they eat (even if it’s just a snack), after coughing or sneezing, after petting a stranger’s dog, after a day at school, and after anything else that could have led to germy hands. It seems like a small thing, but hand washing is really the best and most effective way to stop the spreading of germs.
5. Let the Emotions Flow
In your body, everything is interconnected, which means that poor emotional health can actually weaken the immune system. If your child is sad, let them be sad; according to studies, it’s a good practice to allow your children the space to feel and connect with their emotions. Just because they’re little doesn’t mean their feelings are invalid (even if they might seem so to you), and it’s important to keep that in mind.
As a parent, there are few things you want more than to keep your children healthy so that they can live long and live well. Follow these tips so that your family can live their healthiest, happiest, most fulfilling lives.
