The Best Workout For Busy Dads

Dadpack Digest, V4.1

Dear Dads,

You've made it nearly halfway through November, and you know what that means? It’s time to acknowledge Movember, a month where men grow mustaches to raise awareness about men's health. That’s all great, but the thing is you don’t have to sprout any face lace to start caring about your body, unless you're looking to unleash your inner Burt Reynolds.

Regardless of what you do with your facial hair, you can start being more proactive about your physical health by exercising more regularly. The best part is that you don't have to let it take away from time with your kid either, if you're willing to explore play more active ways to engage with them.

While we’re on the topic of small changes to benefit your health, let’s delve into how to manage sleep loss as a new parent, and not kid ourselves with the illusion of sleeping when the baby sleeps.

Despite how challenging being a dad can be, young Sneakerheads are putting themselves in your shoes quite literally – mostly by stealing your classic footwear look, but fail to co-opt the same exhaustion.

But really, you can’t blame the guys for having good taste.

This Week From Dadpack

• The only exercise there's time for: The good news is roughhousing, wrestling, and running around chasing your kid benefits their overall development. The bad news is it’s still cardio.

• They said there would be sleep: All newborn babies seem to do is sleep, but that turns out to mean very little for their deliriously tired parents.

• Why everyone loves appropriating dad culture: Young men adopting dad shoes proves that some style is also ultimately about sensibility.

• There are better ways to save money on heat: Winter is coming and so are angry dad thermostat memes.

• You might not want to take this marriage advice: A lot of people can try to give you good marriage guidance, but it’s the bad advice that will really teach you something.

The Best Workout For Busy Dads Is Horseplay

It only takes about 30 to 45 minutes of exercise a day to increase your longevity, studies say. But it takes a lot for busy dads to carve out that much time alone – unless of course, you do it while playing with your kid.

It’s an intriguing premise. Roughhousing, or what experts refer to as “rough and tumble play,” has a number of research-backed benefits for children’s cognitive development. Namely, it teaches children how to read emotional and social cues, by learning the difference between play fighting and real aggression. On top of that, it facilitates the growing bond between fathers and their children.

At the same time, little ones get to burn off their seemingly endless reserves of energy, and you get to run off a few calories in the process. So why not increase your lifespan while benefiting their development?

Myfitnesspal users agree that roughhousing is comparable to wrestling in terms of cardiovascular activity, but many of them also say using a heart rate monitor to gauge how much you’re getting out of your horseplay. Psych Central similarly recommends ticking, chasing, rolling, tumbling and even a playful push or shove here and there, as basic roughhousing moves.

And if you’re currently nervous about roughhousing with small children, jumping up and down never fails to amuse kids or count as a plyometric workout Or, if your baby isn’t old enough to roughhouse and wrestle yet, Elise Cappella, a psychology professor at New York University and fellow parent, suggests getting a jogger stroller and running with your infant.

“We’d sing songs, I’d run, and they would eat their Cheerios,” Cappella told Quartz.

That said, if your toddler isn’t into wrestling, you can always try a dance party. Dancing burns approximately 300 to 800 calories per hour depending on your weight and how hard you’re grooving. But if you go that route, you’re going to have to deal with your kid’s terrible taste in music.

And all that KIDZ Bop will make you want to roughhouse.

For more on roughhousing:

The Myth Of "I'll Sleep When The Baby Sleeps"

One of life’s little mysteries is how tiny babies seem to sleep all the time and yet their parents never get to. Although it’s true that newborns sleep anywhere from 14 to 19 hours a day, those hours are unpredictable and nearly impossible to harness.

And it only gets worse from there. On average, parents lose up to 109 minutes of sleep every night their first year of parenting. Other data indicates that moms and dads get shafted on 6 months worth of sleep within the first 24 months.

The point is, parents can’t just magically pass out when the baby decides to sleep – they have laundry to fold, bottles to wash, and work emails to return, among other things. Rather than relying on a flawed old adage, the consensus among parents on Reddit appears to be taking designated shifts, and letting the baby decide who gets to sleep from there.

At least, that's one way to see who they like more.

The Rise Of The Dad Shoe

Jacob Gallagher, a writer at the Wall Street Journal, accurately described the popular Asics’ Gel-Kayano 14 model “dad sneaker” as more of an uncle sneaker. And at $180 a pop, uncles are likely the only guys throwing their disposable income at these kicks. However, actual fathers like Michigan-based Dennis Cifor, 63, don't feel mocked or insulted by the dadcore trend. In fact, they find it quite practical.

“They’re comfortable shoes, they kinda go with everything,” Cifor told the WSJ. “If you see all these people wearing these shoes, maybe disregard the fact that they’re a little bit older than you and say there must be something to this. They figured some things out in life, so why not take advantage of it.”

In other words, dad shoes are popular because dads are always right.

Never, Ever Touch Dad's Thermostat

Children who mess with the thermostat have always the bane of any budget-conscious parents’ existence, and the dad who's mad about the thermostat is a timeless trope. So it’s no surprise that every holiday season, a popular meme emerges with a simple parenting hack.

Jokes aside, there are better ways to save money on heat than stressing out a child about utility bills. The New York Times advises using double-celled blackout shades and good old fashioned plastic wrap blow dried over your windows as insulation to keep heat in. Likewise, Reddit users pose strategies like heating yourself instead of the air, with an electric blanket or electric mattress pad.

But as for turning on the light in the car? Don’t even get us started.

Parting Paternalism: Most Marriage Advice Ideal

Prior to “getting hitched,” soon to be spouse, Twitter user @WereGnnaMkeIt recently solicited the worst marriage advice people had ever received. Many of the responses were obvious jokes, like “​Refer to her eyebrows as facial hair.” Or “When you get mad at her yell and be audibly angry towards her.”

In terms of what would pass off as good advice, some of the answers on the thread hit a little too close to home. For example, “happy wife, happy life” is something a lot of people say without realizing how ridiculous that notion is. No one is happy all the time, including your wife, and trying to make her that way will probably drive both of you nuts.

The takeaway is that a lot of marriage advice sucks, especially if it rhymes. So you may as well trust your instincts and do what you want. Or if you’re really stumped, then talk to a therapist and not the Internet.