How do I encourage family exercise to help me manage my diabetes?

Open communication with all family members about your diabetes is the key. Diabetes is a disease that impacts the whole family and the more you know about the disease itself the more you will be able to involve your family with the management. Promoting family exercise can be a fun way to improve your diabetes, reduce complications, reduce your family’s risk of developing diabetes and bring the family closer together. Perhaps a game could be made out of different exercise activities, exploring which exercise activities improve blood sugar levels. Games could be expanded to diet and meal planning as well. I frequently tell families not to think of the diet and exercise as a punishment but more as a challenge that can be fun and creative. I also remind them that those activities and foods that are good for diabetics are good for everyone. Make managing your diabetes fun, while improving your health, your familie’s health and your relationships.

The point here is that exercise benefits everyone in the family. Fitness should not be looked at as something that should be done because someone else has been labeled with a disease. We are all on this boat of life together! Yes, it is imperative that you need exercise to manage your diabetes. But, it is crucial that your family really understands that exercise is needed to benefit their own health also. We all need physical activity! We all need to feed our energy off of one another! And, guess what? We all benefit!