April 23, 2025 • 21 mins
In this episode of the Mother of Boys (MOB) Podcast, we’re joined by strength and conditioning expert Annie Carey Linton to talk all things movement, muscles, and motivation for boys! 💪 From early play to teen training, Annie shares how moms can support healthy physical development at every age.
🎙 Listen now on your favorite podcast platform 📘 Grab the book: Mothers of Boys Survival Guide 🌐 Join the community: MothersOfBoys.life
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Episode Transcript
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Built to Move (00:04):
A Guide to Boys Physical Development and Conditioning.
Hello, and welcome to the Mothers of Boys podcast, or as we like to call it,
The Mob. This is a place where we dive into real conversations with experts, offering advice,
insights, and strategies to help moms navigate the fun, rewarding, and sometimes challenging
(00:25):
world of raising boys. I'm Cheryl Bond.Suzy Shaw: And I'm Suzy Shaw. And today's
podcast is titled Built to Move (00:31):
A Guide to Boys Physical Development and Conditioning.
Today's guest is Annie Carey Linton. Annie has her Master's of Education in Exercise Physiology from
Temple University. She is a pediatric clinical exercise physiologist at Children's Hospital of
Philadelphia and serves as a lifestyle medicine health coach for the Division of Cardiology
(00:56):
and the Connective Tissue Disorder Program. She teaches strength conditioning TRX classes at her
local Y and is a personal trainer and has taught as an adjunct professor at Eastern University,
Cabrini, and West Chester University and their departments of Exercise Science.
She has over 30 years of hands-on experience in clinical exercise physiology,
(01:20):
specializing in pediatric health care with a longstanding commitment to
improving the health and well-being of children through movement and
evidence-based care. Welcome Annie. Thank you so much for being here.
Hi there. How are you?
Great. So you are sort of like a superhero mom. Your kids are
(01:44):
lucky to have someone with so much experience in exercise physiology.
I wouldn't go as far as saying superhero, but it's sort of passion for myself and having
that knowledge and being able to bring it to the table to my kids, it's been a great experience.
(02:07):
So, Annie, can we just start off with, you know, what is clinical exercise physiology?
Well, briefly, clinical exercise physiology is a health care specialization using exercise
and physical activity to prevent, treat, and manage chronic conditions. And at the Children's
Hospital of Philadelphia, I work in the division of cardiology in which we use exercise metabolic
(02:32):
testing, which is basically stress testing, if you've heard of stress testing before,
to assess current levels of fitness for children with congenital heart disease,
as well as symptoms associated with exercise. Like sometimes we'll have
kids that will come in and say, you know, I had chest pain while I was playing soccer,
or maybe I was short of breath when I was running at recess,
(02:57):
you know. So those type of symptomatic type of situations are what we assess the children with.
What should parents know about how much physical activity their kids
should have at different stages of development?
Right. Well, sure. As a mother of boys and girls as well, we know that from the get-go,
(03:22):
the goal for any infant is to, you know, be able to prop them up, roll themselves over,
and crawl, sit up and crawl. And then we praise, as parents,
we praise every movement that they make, like, “yay, they did it, oh my gosh.”
And then because we're so proud of them and we can't wait till they get to the next milestone.
(03:43):
Now, my first child, Kaylee, was born, was a girl, and she was a preemie,
so her milestones of sitting up, rolling over, and, you know, crawling were delayed
for several months. But 17 months later, I have a son named Holden, who was not a preemie. In fact,
he came out of the womb looking around as if, like, he, like, owned the place. He met his
(04:09):
milestones a lot faster. He was sitting up, crawling, and climbing on my coffee table by
eight months and projecting himself off and thinking this was the funniest thing ever.
And so having, like, his delay, my daughter's delay, and his advancement in milestones, it was
like having twins, like thing one and thing two, running and wreaking havoc all over my house and,
(04:33):
you know, in the living room. So as far as, you know, when we talk about kids, you know,
as I said, from an infant standpoint, we just want them to meet their milestones.
And our bodies are meant to move. So when we ask what the appropriate amount of exercise babies,
toddlers, kids, and teens should be doing, the quick answer to all of this is as
(04:53):
much as they can. And I think that with most parents, we really grapple with, like, well,
how much is too much? How much is too little? What should we be doing with our kids? And with
the childhood obesity being a chronic concern for parents, you know, and Americans, there are
guidelines that have been put forward for kids of all ages, according to the CDC, which is the
(05:18):
Center for Disease Control, the physical activity guidelines for Americans states that, like,
school-aged kids should at least be doing about 60 to 90 minutes a day of moderate to heavy exercise.
And that, you know, school-age, we can go, you know, is that a toddler? Because
toddlers are moving around all the time. But what I want to emphasize is that moderate to
(05:44):
heavy is where they're not just walking. They are getting their heart rate up,
their breathing rate up, they're, you know, getting a little glistening with, you know,
sweat. So that is really what, you know, the goal is when you talk about physical activity.
And so, Annie, when it comes to kids at different ages, what kinds of
(06:06):
physical activities do you think are the most helpful or important for their development?
Aerobic exercise where you're using large muscle groups for walking, running, biking,
swimming, hiking, you know, anything like that, where we're also...could also put in another
(06:28):
category of sports, you know, whether you're playing baseball, football, basketball, tennis,
pickleball, which everybody's doing these days, and, you know, golf, soccer,
lacrosse, you name it, all those sports are valuable in helping condition kids.
(06:50):
But one category that I think that is really, I wouldn't say overlooked, but it's less stressed
for kids is strength training. And I think that strength training and conditioning is what I see
personally as one of the most important activities that we can get our kids to participate in.
So Annie, tell us what the difference is. What is weightlifting and strength training,
(07:15):
and are they the same thing? Is that what you're suggesting?
No. Now, I don't want to confuse strength training with weightlifting because, you know,
I'm not suggesting that you go out and get play school baby weights for your toddlers, but young
kids as young as two and three are already using their own body weight to move, groove, and learn
(07:38):
physical skills that they're going to need for a lifetime. They stand, they push, they pull, they
squat, they, you know, pull under the dog's tail, you know, they're running up and down the steps.
And all those are body weight exercise activities that are enhancing their growth and stamina.
(07:59):
Well, Annie, can you share some unique or
creative ideas for exercise that might not be widely known to help get kids moving?
Sure. Well, truth be told that when my kids were really young, I used to try to make cleaning their
room really, really fun. And I'd first let them jump on the bed for a little bit and say, hey,
(08:23):
now it's time to clean the room, you know, and well, believe it or not, jumping on bed can be
very good exercise. And then the kids would say, yay, it's time to clean the room. And we'd like,
I'd say, like, now get on your bellies and like crawl and get, you know, pick up all the clothes
under your bed and, you know, let's put them in and we play music and we kind of dance around and,
(08:44):
but that lasted till about four or five. And then, you know, they found other activities to do.
So like if a toddler is watching his mom do yoga exercises in the living room, nine
times out of 10, that kid's going to get on the floor and try to do exactly what mommy's doing.
(09:06):
And I think that just these types of, you know, modeling for the kids is a really great way to
get them to participate if, you know, you're willing to show them what to do.
So Annie, in my book, Mother's a Boy's Survival Guide, I call my boys Earnest and Exuberance.
(09:32):
And let's just say I didn't have much of a problem getting Exuberance to do all the exercising that
he wanted to do. Ernest, on the other hand, was much happier doing quiet things. And so
he would have been happy playing his Legos, not necessarily running around the house and
(09:54):
doing the physical activity. And when it came time to get him involved in sports,
it took a little bit more encouragement to get him to play soccer or those sort of activities. Do
you have any suggestions for parents and moms for getting the Earnests of the world up and moving?
(10:16):
One thing that we hear so often is that my child doesn't like to do anything. All they
want to be is on their computer. It's what they want to do. They don't like sports.
They don't like this. They don't like that. And they're just very sedentary. And I think that,
you know, that can create a predicament in the household, but it also can be a motivator.
(10:41):
I did have a patient that I had worked with over the years, actually, a couple years ago.
He was probably a little overweight for his age. And he and his mom and I talked about, you know,
I was working with him as his health coach. And we talked about the idea of what could
(11:05):
he do in order to kind of get active? And she said, because he loves being on the computer.
So we had discussed this idea of the virtual reality, like a VR system that he was getting
for his birthday. And so when we talked together, along with the 11-year-old and his mom, we came
(11:28):
up with this idea. He said there were two games that his friends had. It was called Ninja Fruit,
which is where when you have those goggles on, you know, there's fruits coming at you and you have to
like slice it and kick it and punch it. And, you know, it's a lot of, a lot of, you know, movement.
And the other one he came up with was called Gorilla Tag,
(11:51):
which I am assuming that you're playing tag with a gorilla or you're, I think
you're being chased by a gorilla. I'm not exactly sure which, what it is, but we had, we hadn't
worked together for like a couple months. And when I saw him, we were talking, he had lost about 10
(12:12):
pounds. And I said, wow, what's going on? And his mom said he plays Gorilla Tag every day
with, and his friends. He has friends that like they go online and they all play together.
So you can take what they like to do, which may be be on the computer and,
(12:33):
and connect with their friends via the computer. Some of these games are,
there's a lot of things out there that are actually really valuable and very helpful
for kids to engage after school or, you know, with, with each other on weekends
or a rainy day when they're, when that in-person meeting is impossible to happen.
(12:57):
So Annie, can you offer some practical tips on incorporating more movement into the everyday
routine when kids have a really full schedule with homework and classes and, and other things?
One thing we do know is that exercise gets the blood flowing. So it increases cognitive
functioning, just like for attention, memory, it increases our neural connections, it boosts
(13:22):
executive functioning of the brain, which is the planning and decision making part. And it
releases stress that so many kids today have. And not to mention it, it enhancers, enhances
motor skills such as balance and coordination with activities. And it also activates the
brain regions for cognitive processes, which allows us to sort of do math homework, right?
(13:49):
If they can take a break before they even come home from school, put that half an hour before
they even sit down and study and just run around, get their blood flowing. It actually
will enhance their ability to do their homework much better and sometimes even more efficiently.
(14:13):
That makes sense.
So Annie, I know you work with a variety of children of different ages. So how
do you motivate a child to exercise and become more interested in being active?
The first thing that we really try to hone in on is what is it that you like to do?
(14:33):
Let's start with the SMART Goals, which is an acronym: S is being Specific,
M is Measurable, A is Achievable, R is Relevant, and T is Time bound.
And when they have control over what activity they have decided on, they're making the decisions. And
(14:56):
the whole point of the SMART Goals is that it's their idea, not yours. It's not my idea and I'm
not telling them what to do. They're actually coming up with the plan. They're coming up with
the idea and, and, you know, with kids especially, keeping the time bound part of it short, like,
"Okay, do you think you could do that for one week? Let's start with one week. And then you say,
(15:20):
okay, well, how about for two weeks?” And then it, you know, we know that the more,
you know, time goes by and they're continuing to do it, the more they're going to stick with it.
So having SMART Goals is really about goal setting
for the individual with them being the person in control.
So Annie, you're typically, you're working with the child one-on-one,
(15:44):
but how do you advise the parents to be when they, the child leaves you and they go home?
Do you give them advice on what they should be doing until the next time the child sees you?
Yeah, you know, as a health coach and also as a mother, I know for a fact
that the more you pressure your kids to do something, the less they will want to do it.
(16:09):
And I guess you could call that “resistance training,” right? So finding what interests them
and asking them what ways they can get started gives the kids autonomy
to try something on their own. If they have a dog, you know, can they, do you think you
(16:32):
could start being responsible for taking the dog for a walk if they're not going to do a sport?
I think it's important that parents are role models and not finger shakers and say, you know,
you need to do this because we know that kids want to feel in control. And when it comes to exercise,
(16:54):
they will definitely feel much more energized, more likely to stick with an activity and feel
a lot better about themselves if they're the ones who set the goal, you know,
decided on what activity they were going to do. And they start to have a little more
self-confidence in themselves when they've set goals and they're able to achieve them.
(17:18):
You know, one of the things that we do say from a professional standpoint is to try to not
provide food rewards, you know, where every now and then it's okay, but, you know, by giving,
you know, food, ice creams and candies and things like that, and, you know, some kids might just
(17:40):
want the money. If you exercise, I'll pay you, okay? My kids certainly did. I think that just
finding some sort of balance in the reward system and just even just personal satisfaction that they
were able to do something may just be enough for some of these kids to continue to participate.
(18:03):
Yeah, definitely. Well, there's plenty of research linking exercise to mental health.
Have you noticed anything personally when you're
dealing with your patients when it comes to mental health and wellness?
Absolutely. I can say for sure that I've been coaching with some of my kids for years and
(18:28):
how they have transformed from these younger teens to these awesome,
like, young adults has just been amazing.
They're the ones making the decisions on what they're going to do,
how they're going to exercise, how they're going to eat healthier,
if they're going to get better sleep at night. So those are some of the goals that we work on.
(18:53):
Even some kids, you know, say, I play too much video games. I want to slow down on that. I want
to put that away. So I think that setting these goals and them making their own goals
and them achieving their own goals has been really just such a great thing to watch.
(19:14):
Yeah, it builds confidence. Sure does. They feel good about their decisions.
So Annie, can you share any resources with our mothers of boys community?
Absolutely. So probably one of the best places to start would be at where I work
at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. They have their own website. It's at chop.edu. Look
(19:40):
up exercise apps. That's a great place to start. In addition, we often use darebee.com exercises
to give you some ideas of how to put together a little bit of a workout for your children.
Annie, we like to ask all our guests, if you have a motto or a mantra that sums up how you think
(20:04):
about this topic, you know, something that you come back to or something that you try to live by.
Yes, it would be. “Stay as strong as you can for as long as you can.”
Bravo.
Yeah, that's key. Well, thank you, Annie. This was so insightful, and I think you
(20:28):
really provided a lot of great advice to our moms. I think particularly, you know,
the whole concept of parents trying to make the activities fun and having activities that you
wouldn't normally consider exercise, having them be exercise and making them fun. And I
(20:49):
think also it's important that the parents, like you said, set a good example themselves.
And thank you all for joining us today. Follow The Mob on Facebook, Instagram,
YouTube and your favorite podcast platform. Be kind to yourselves, moms, and have a great week.
A Guide to Boys Physical Development and Conditioning.
Hello, and welcome to the Mothers of Boys podcast, or as we like to call it,
The Mob. This is a place where we dive into real conversations with experts, offering advice,
insights, and strategies to help moms navigate the fun, rewarding, and sometimes challenging
(00:25):
world of raising boys. I'm Cheryl Bond.Suzy Shaw: And I'm Suzy Shaw. And today's
podcast is titled Built to Move (00:31):
A Guide to Boys Physical Development and Conditioning.
Today's guest is Annie Carey Linton. Annie has her Master's of Education in Exercise Physiology from
Temple University. She is a pediatric clinical exercise physiologist at Children's Hospital of
Philadelphia and serves as a lifestyle medicine health coach for the Division of Cardiology
(00:56):
and the Connective Tissue Disorder Program. She teaches strength conditioning TRX classes at her
local Y and is a personal trainer and has taught as an adjunct professor at Eastern University,
Cabrini, and West Chester University and their departments of Exercise Science.
She has over 30 years of hands-on experience in clinical exercise physiology,
(01:20):
specializing in pediatric health care with a longstanding commitment to
improving the health and well-being of children through movement and
evidence-based care. Welcome Annie. Thank you so much for being here.
Hi there. How are you?
Great. So you are sort of like a superhero mom. Your kids are
(01:44):
lucky to have someone with so much experience in exercise physiology.
I wouldn't go as far as saying superhero, but it's sort of passion for myself and having
that knowledge and being able to bring it to the table to my kids, it's been a great experience.
(02:07):
So, Annie, can we just start off with, you know, what is clinical exercise physiology?
Well, briefly, clinical exercise physiology is a health care specialization using exercise
and physical activity to prevent, treat, and manage chronic conditions. And at the Children's
Hospital of Philadelphia, I work in the division of cardiology in which we use exercise metabolic
(02:32):
testing, which is basically stress testing, if you've heard of stress testing before,
to assess current levels of fitness for children with congenital heart disease,
as well as symptoms associated with exercise. Like sometimes we'll have
kids that will come in and say, you know, I had chest pain while I was playing soccer,
or maybe I was short of breath when I was running at recess,
(02:57):
you know. So those type of symptomatic type of situations are what we assess the children with.
What should parents know about how much physical activity their kids
should have at different stages of development?
Right. Well, sure. As a mother of boys and girls as well, we know that from the get-go,
(03:22):
the goal for any infant is to, you know, be able to prop them up, roll themselves over,
and crawl, sit up and crawl. And then we praise, as parents,
we praise every movement that they make, like, “yay, they did it, oh my gosh.”
And then because we're so proud of them and we can't wait till they get to the next milestone.
(03:43):
Now, my first child, Kaylee, was born, was a girl, and she was a preemie,
so her milestones of sitting up, rolling over, and, you know, crawling were delayed
for several months. But 17 months later, I have a son named Holden, who was not a preemie. In fact,
he came out of the womb looking around as if, like, he, like, owned the place. He met his
(04:09):
milestones a lot faster. He was sitting up, crawling, and climbing on my coffee table by
eight months and projecting himself off and thinking this was the funniest thing ever.
And so having, like, his delay, my daughter's delay, and his advancement in milestones, it was
like having twins, like thing one and thing two, running and wreaking havoc all over my house and,
(04:33):
you know, in the living room. So as far as, you know, when we talk about kids, you know,
as I said, from an infant standpoint, we just want them to meet their milestones.
And our bodies are meant to move. So when we ask what the appropriate amount of exercise babies,
toddlers, kids, and teens should be doing, the quick answer to all of this is as
(04:53):
much as they can. And I think that with most parents, we really grapple with, like, well,
how much is too much? How much is too little? What should we be doing with our kids? And with
the childhood obesity being a chronic concern for parents, you know, and Americans, there are
guidelines that have been put forward for kids of all ages, according to the CDC, which is the
(05:18):
Center for Disease Control, the physical activity guidelines for Americans states that, like,
school-aged kids should at least be doing about 60 to 90 minutes a day of moderate to heavy exercise.
And that, you know, school-age, we can go, you know, is that a toddler? Because
toddlers are moving around all the time. But what I want to emphasize is that moderate to
(05:44):
heavy is where they're not just walking. They are getting their heart rate up,
their breathing rate up, they're, you know, getting a little glistening with, you know,
sweat. So that is really what, you know, the goal is when you talk about physical activity.
And so, Annie, when it comes to kids at different ages, what kinds of
(06:06):
physical activities do you think are the most helpful or important for their development?
Aerobic exercise where you're using large muscle groups for walking, running, biking,
swimming, hiking, you know, anything like that, where we're also...could also put in another
(06:28):
category of sports, you know, whether you're playing baseball, football, basketball, tennis,
pickleball, which everybody's doing these days, and, you know, golf, soccer,
lacrosse, you name it, all those sports are valuable in helping condition kids.
(06:50):
But one category that I think that is really, I wouldn't say overlooked, but it's less stressed
for kids is strength training. And I think that strength training and conditioning is what I see
personally as one of the most important activities that we can get our kids to participate in.
So Annie, tell us what the difference is. What is weightlifting and strength training,
(07:15):
and are they the same thing? Is that what you're suggesting?
No. Now, I don't want to confuse strength training with weightlifting because, you know,
I'm not suggesting that you go out and get play school baby weights for your toddlers, but young
kids as young as two and three are already using their own body weight to move, groove, and learn
(07:38):
physical skills that they're going to need for a lifetime. They stand, they push, they pull, they
squat, they, you know, pull under the dog's tail, you know, they're running up and down the steps.
And all those are body weight exercise activities that are enhancing their growth and stamina.
(07:59):
Well, Annie, can you share some unique or
creative ideas for exercise that might not be widely known to help get kids moving?
Sure. Well, truth be told that when my kids were really young, I used to try to make cleaning their
room really, really fun. And I'd first let them jump on the bed for a little bit and say, hey,
(08:23):
now it's time to clean the room, you know, and well, believe it or not, jumping on bed can be
very good exercise. And then the kids would say, yay, it's time to clean the room. And we'd like,
I'd say, like, now get on your bellies and like crawl and get, you know, pick up all the clothes
under your bed and, you know, let's put them in and we play music and we kind of dance around and,
(08:44):
but that lasted till about four or five. And then, you know, they found other activities to do.
So like if a toddler is watching his mom do yoga exercises in the living room, nine
times out of 10, that kid's going to get on the floor and try to do exactly what mommy's doing.
(09:06):
And I think that just these types of, you know, modeling for the kids is a really great way to
get them to participate if, you know, you're willing to show them what to do.
So Annie, in my book, Mother's a Boy's Survival Guide, I call my boys Earnest and Exuberance.
(09:32):
And let's just say I didn't have much of a problem getting Exuberance to do all the exercising that
he wanted to do. Ernest, on the other hand, was much happier doing quiet things. And so
he would have been happy playing his Legos, not necessarily running around the house and
(09:54):
doing the physical activity. And when it came time to get him involved in sports,
it took a little bit more encouragement to get him to play soccer or those sort of activities. Do
you have any suggestions for parents and moms for getting the Earnests of the world up and moving?
(10:16):
One thing that we hear so often is that my child doesn't like to do anything. All they
want to be is on their computer. It's what they want to do. They don't like sports.
They don't like this. They don't like that. And they're just very sedentary. And I think that,
you know, that can create a predicament in the household, but it also can be a motivator.
(10:41):
I did have a patient that I had worked with over the years, actually, a couple years ago.
He was probably a little overweight for his age. And he and his mom and I talked about, you know,
I was working with him as his health coach. And we talked about the idea of what could
(11:05):
he do in order to kind of get active? And she said, because he loves being on the computer.
So we had discussed this idea of the virtual reality, like a VR system that he was getting
for his birthday. And so when we talked together, along with the 11-year-old and his mom, we came
(11:28):
up with this idea. He said there were two games that his friends had. It was called Ninja Fruit,
which is where when you have those goggles on, you know, there's fruits coming at you and you have to
like slice it and kick it and punch it. And, you know, it's a lot of, a lot of, you know, movement.
And the other one he came up with was called Gorilla Tag,
(11:51):
which I am assuming that you're playing tag with a gorilla or you're, I think
you're being chased by a gorilla. I'm not exactly sure which, what it is, but we had, we hadn't
worked together for like a couple months. And when I saw him, we were talking, he had lost about 10
(12:12):
pounds. And I said, wow, what's going on? And his mom said he plays Gorilla Tag every day
with, and his friends. He has friends that like they go online and they all play together.
So you can take what they like to do, which may be be on the computer and,
(12:33):
and connect with their friends via the computer. Some of these games are,
there's a lot of things out there that are actually really valuable and very helpful
for kids to engage after school or, you know, with, with each other on weekends
or a rainy day when they're, when that in-person meeting is impossible to happen.
(12:57):
So Annie, can you offer some practical tips on incorporating more movement into the everyday
routine when kids have a really full schedule with homework and classes and, and other things?
One thing we do know is that exercise gets the blood flowing. So it increases cognitive
functioning, just like for attention, memory, it increases our neural connections, it boosts
(13:22):
executive functioning of the brain, which is the planning and decision making part. And it
releases stress that so many kids today have. And not to mention it, it enhancers, enhances
motor skills such as balance and coordination with activities. And it also activates the
brain regions for cognitive processes, which allows us to sort of do math homework, right?
(13:49):
If they can take a break before they even come home from school, put that half an hour before
they even sit down and study and just run around, get their blood flowing. It actually
will enhance their ability to do their homework much better and sometimes even more efficiently.
(14:13):
That makes sense.
So Annie, I know you work with a variety of children of different ages. So how
do you motivate a child to exercise and become more interested in being active?
The first thing that we really try to hone in on is what is it that you like to do?
(14:33):
Let's start with the SMART Goals, which is an acronym: S is being Specific,
M is Measurable, A is Achievable, R is Relevant, and T is Time bound.
And when they have control over what activity they have decided on, they're making the decisions. And
(14:56):
the whole point of the SMART Goals is that it's their idea, not yours. It's not my idea and I'm
not telling them what to do. They're actually coming up with the plan. They're coming up with
the idea and, and, you know, with kids especially, keeping the time bound part of it short, like,
"Okay, do you think you could do that for one week? Let's start with one week. And then you say,
(15:20):
okay, well, how about for two weeks?” And then it, you know, we know that the more,
you know, time goes by and they're continuing to do it, the more they're going to stick with it.
So having SMART Goals is really about goal setting
for the individual with them being the person in control.
So Annie, you're typically, you're working with the child one-on-one,
(15:44):
but how do you advise the parents to be when they, the child leaves you and they go home?
Do you give them advice on what they should be doing until the next time the child sees you?
Yeah, you know, as a health coach and also as a mother, I know for a fact
that the more you pressure your kids to do something, the less they will want to do it.
(16:09):
And I guess you could call that “resistance training,” right? So finding what interests them
and asking them what ways they can get started gives the kids autonomy
to try something on their own. If they have a dog, you know, can they, do you think you
(16:32):
could start being responsible for taking the dog for a walk if they're not going to do a sport?
I think it's important that parents are role models and not finger shakers and say, you know,
you need to do this because we know that kids want to feel in control. And when it comes to exercise,
(16:54):
they will definitely feel much more energized, more likely to stick with an activity and feel
a lot better about themselves if they're the ones who set the goal, you know,
decided on what activity they were going to do. And they start to have a little more
self-confidence in themselves when they've set goals and they're able to achieve them.
(17:18):
You know, one of the things that we do say from a professional standpoint is to try to not
provide food rewards, you know, where every now and then it's okay, but, you know, by giving,
you know, food, ice creams and candies and things like that, and, you know, some kids might just
(17:40):
want the money. If you exercise, I'll pay you, okay? My kids certainly did. I think that just
finding some sort of balance in the reward system and just even just personal satisfaction that they
were able to do something may just be enough for some of these kids to continue to participate.
(18:03):
Yeah, definitely. Well, there's plenty of research linking exercise to mental health.
Have you noticed anything personally when you're
dealing with your patients when it comes to mental health and wellness?
Absolutely. I can say for sure that I've been coaching with some of my kids for years and
(18:28):
how they have transformed from these younger teens to these awesome,
like, young adults has just been amazing.
They're the ones making the decisions on what they're going to do,
how they're going to exercise, how they're going to eat healthier,
if they're going to get better sleep at night. So those are some of the goals that we work on.
(18:53):
Even some kids, you know, say, I play too much video games. I want to slow down on that. I want
to put that away. So I think that setting these goals and them making their own goals
and them achieving their own goals has been really just such a great thing to watch.
(19:14):
Yeah, it builds confidence. Sure does. They feel good about their decisions.
So Annie, can you share any resources with our mothers of boys community?
Absolutely. So probably one of the best places to start would be at where I work
at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. They have their own website. It's at chop.edu. Look
(19:40):
up exercise apps. That's a great place to start. In addition, we often use darebee.com exercises
to give you some ideas of how to put together a little bit of a workout for your children.
Annie, we like to ask all our guests, if you have a motto or a mantra that sums up how you think
(20:04):
about this topic, you know, something that you come back to or something that you try to live by.
Yes, it would be. “Stay as strong as you can for as long as you can.”
Bravo.
Yeah, that's key. Well, thank you, Annie. This was so insightful, and I think you
(20:28):
really provided a lot of great advice to our moms. I think particularly, you know,
the whole concept of parents trying to make the activities fun and having activities that you
wouldn't normally consider exercise, having them be exercise and making them fun. And I
(20:49):
think also it's important that the parents, like you said, set a good example themselves.
And thank you all for joining us today. Follow The Mob on Facebook, Instagram,
YouTube and your favorite podcast platform. Be kind to yourselves, moms, and have a great week.
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