Walking for Wellness

Walk Maryland Day is October 10, 2018. Walk Maryland Day is a day to celebrate the official state exercise - walking! It's also a way to promote awareness about how walking improves our health. October 10th is also Walk to School Day. Help the entire community come together to promote health and safer routes for students to walk and bike to school. These are great events to help people be active and start walking in your neighborhood.  Think about ways to be active every day, not just one special day.

Why focus on walking?  Well - walking is a great way to be active, you can do it anytime, anywhere, and it does not require special skills or equipment. The health benefits of walking may:

• Reduce the risk of diseases like heart disease, stroke, diabetes, and cancer.
• Improve blood pressure and blood sugar levels.
• Increase energy level.
• Decrease stress.
• Help prevent weight gain.

If you are new to walking, or haven’t been active in a while, start off slowly. Try 5 -10 minutes to start. Work up to 30 minutes per day. If you don’t have 30 minutes at once, get creative and break up your activity into shorter sessions. For example start the day by parking or getting off the bus/train 10 minutes away from your job and walk briskly to work.  At lunch, walk for 10 minutes around where you work, inside or out. End the work day by walking briskly for 10 minutes back to your car or station.

Still not convinced you should stop reading this and go for a walk? Check out this list of 100 reasons to go for a walk.

Be an Active Family

We move all day long, but we still may not be getting enough health benefits from physical activity unless we use energy to move our bodies with purpose.  That isn't as hard as you might think; walking, gardening, pushing a stroller, biking, climbing stairs, and dancing are all ways to be physically active!

What kinds of physical activity?
Your family's physical activity needs to be moderate to vigorous to be beneficial to your health.   Light activity doesn't raise your heart rate or cause to you to breathe harder, but moderate and vigorous activity does, and that is what your goal for physical activity should be for the whole family.

Mix and match moderate and vigorous physical activity throughout the week.  Try taking a brisk (fast) walk after dinner one night, playing a game of basketball the next, tidying up the yard together, and having a dance contest at home the next night!

How much physical activity?
Young children under age 5 are encouraged to be physically active several times each day.  Children ages 5 to 17 should be physically active 60 minutes each day.  Adults need to combine moderate and vigorous physical activity with strengthening activities.  Visit the Choose MyPlate website and Let's Move website for more ways to be active.

Challenge your family members to come up with their own ideas for exciting ways to be physically active together.  Find fun things to do as a family and be sure to schedule time to do them -- let physical activity be your family's reward each day for finishing other tasks.

One program that your family could join is the Walk MD program through University of Maryland Extension.  This program encourages walking and exploring Maryland!