Can anyone help me with my crazy life???

Shantabulous

Shantabulous

Cathlete
First of all, an introduction. My name is Shannon and I like to refer to myself as a full time working, stay at home, single parent. I'm happily married; however, my husband and I feel like single parents because we both work 12 hr shifts on opposite days of each other, meaning one of us is home alone for roughly 14hrs a day with our 4 children. This in itself wouldn't be too bad; however, 3 of our 4 children are 2 yr old TRIPLETS! 2 girls and a boy and we also have a 4.5 yr old daughter.

My dilemna is TIME! I have very little, which makes it hard to fit in a good workout. The triplets nap for about 1.5 hrs a day, which is when I workout for 1 hour on the days I don't work. I want to know how to maximize my time to achieve the best results. I have been doing Cathe workouts for about 10 years now and I love them. I'm thinking of adding 20 mins a day of cardio on my eliptical cross-trainer on the days I work. This would entail getting up at 4am. I don't get home from work until 7pm and I get a whole 1/2 hr to spend with my kids before they go to bed, then an hour with my husband before we go to bed. So doing it when I get home after a 14 hr day isn't very realistic. Though I don't know if getting up at 4 am is realistic either. Anywho...

What would be the best workout for me? Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
 
I usually wake up around 3:30am to do my workout. I have to be at work by 6:00am but I also am in bed by 8-9:00pm. Wow I thought I had a busy life but I guess I cant complain. Good luck!!!
 
Hi Shannon! WELCOME!!! Wow, you DO have your hands full. Do you have the CTX Series? It is a masterpiece and includes every type of cardio: kickbox, step, circuit, intervals & one whole workout devoted just to legs. It includes 6 different workouts which also include a body part in each workout to get your strength work done too...all the cardio & weight work clocks in at about an hour, which also includes ABS/core work. The STS series coming out will clock in around an hour range too. You could do them 3X/week and cardio the other days. Good Luck and give all those lil' sweetie pies a HUG!


http://www.PictureTrail.com/gid8692709


Your-Friend-In-Fitness, DebbieH (AKA "Den Mother Debbie") http://www.clicksmilies.com/s0105/aktion/action-smiley-066.gif[/img] If You Get The Choice To Sit It Out Or Dance, I Hope You DANCE!
 
Shannon - in addition to DebbieH's fine suggestion for CTX, also consider making the Body Blast series's Timesaver disc (5 complete workouts comprised of sections from its original workouts and including cardio and targeted muscle training each workout) and the new 4-Day Split series. You could do one week of CTX (6 workouts, one per day), one week of TimeSaver (5 workouts, one per day), one week of 4-Day Split (4 workouts, one per day), and the fourth week focus on your elliptical and whatever you want for strength training. I'll bet a good portion of your time-starvation is figuring out what to do; this would save you a lot of planning time.

I personally would think twice about trying to get up even earlier to squish in more exercise duration volume. YOU NEED YOUR SLEEP!!! Sleep deprivation inhibits exercise performance and benefits. And you need your family time. Focus on quality workouts rather than quantity.

JMHO -

A-Jock
 
You may want to check out the Fit Pregnancy Forum. There are lots of posts there for moms (pregnancy thru preschool). There's a wealth of information and lots of creative workouts.

Enjoy your bambinos, it sounds like God has really blessed you! Hope to see you over there. ;)

~Melanie~

Jadon born 11/23/05
Justin born 1/17/04
Jory born 4/9/94
 
Hi There!
You are really busy!
How about if you hire a teenage babysitter? It sounds like you could use a break for yourself(that's important), and the babysitter could be there perhaps for a couple of hours while you exercise, and take a shower, maybe 3 days per week? I haven't had a babysitter for years, so I am not sure of the cost, but, with both of you working 12 hours per day maybe you could splurge for a few hours per week on this luxury. It is not like you are leaving the triplets alone, as you can still be around(exercising) :)

Good luck to you.
linda
 
You all have provided great advice for me! I have many Cathe workouts, but not all that are listed. Not sure I can afford to buy anymore at this time. I did just buy the 4day split. My question with that is, is the 20-25m of cardio enough? I usually try to get at least 40 minutes of cardio because I want to lose weight. I know that muscle burns more fat; however, is the 20-25m of cardio in the 4 day split enough to keep my metabolism up? I guess that goes with any of the workouts. I usually try and do the ones with the most cardio. Has my focus been wrong? I do do strength training, but if I have to forgoe one or the other, I usually slack on the weights.
 
I find that I need to do 40-60 min of cardio, but something is better than nothing.
~Melanie~

Jadon born 11/23/05
Justin born 1/17/04
Jory born 4/9/94
 
Hi,Shannon!
This seems like a better question for the "Open Discussion" forum, as it isn't a question directed towards Cathe. You might get more responses there.
 
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