Dear Dish-It, How Do I Get My Family Active?

Advice About Health

Dear Dish-It,

My family is great, but they're a bunch of couch potatoes! All they ever do is sit around the living room and watch TV. And their idea of a fun night is renting DVDs, which I think is fun too, but not all the time! I wanna do other stuff with my parents like go biking and play basketball, but they always say they're too tired. How can I get my family off the couch and be more active with me?
helium kid

Dear helium kid,

It's awesome to see how concerned you are about your family's health! It's pretty hard for people to go from being couch potatoes to active and physically fit, so it's gonna take some time and effort. Start out by having a heart-to-heart talk with your parents about what you've just told me. Tell 'em that you're concerned about their health and that you wanna spend more time with them by getting active and playing sports, and less time watching the tube. It might take awhile, but your concerns will eventually sink in and get your family up and off that couch!

Organize a family fitness day once a week where you bike around your neighborhood, take a hike in your local park or play a game of touch football in the backyard. And on those cold, rainy days when you wanna stay inside but still wanna do somethin' active, challenge your family to a game of DDR or pop the Twister Dance DVD game into the DVD player to get your family movin' and groovin'!

So, ya gotta burnin' question? Need some love directions? Thinkin' 'bout stuff like depression, sex,how ya feel 'bout YOURSELF (that's called "self-esteem"), boyfriends, girlfriends, losin' old friends, bullyin' or peer pressure, but too scared to ask the parents? Don't be scared to .

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