New Year’s Resolutions For Pet Owners

 

New Year’s Resolutions For Pet Owners

It’s a new year which means New Year’s Resolutions!  Most people have great intentions of starting a new year by getting exercising more and being healthy.  However, they don’t always keep up with their new healthy lifestyle after a month or two.  If you made a resolution to be healthier this year, here are some great ideas to keep you on track with the help of your dog!

List Your Changes

The first step to making changes is to list out what changes you want to make.  So when you have a few minutes to spare, sit down and make a list of changes you would like make this year and list how to make it happen.

Your list will likely include:

1. Eating Healthy
2. Exercise More

The tricky part becomes how to implement a plan for the changes.  If you have a dog, they can assist you with in making healthy changes and it will not feel difficult, thus, allowing you to keep up with your New Year’s Resolutions.

Here are some ways to increase your exercise with the help of your dog:

1. Take Your Dog On More Walks or Longer Walks
2. Go To Dog Friendly Events – Get Out Of The House!
3. Visit Dog Parks
4. Play Outside
   • Play fetch with a tennis ball or frisbee or with snowballs!
   • Go sledding or swimming with your dog!
5. Play Indoors
   • Teach your dog new tricks and reward them with healthy treats (carrots, green beans, peanuts, etc)
   • Play fetch, but with a nerf ball/soft toy

These ideas should increase your activity and should keep things fun!

Measure Your Success

You made some healthy changes to your lifestyle, but you are not done yet, you need to continuously measure improvement/success so that you can stay on track.

Be sure to monitor how you are doing on a weekly, monthly, and quarterly basis.  Identify if you made changes to your activity level.  Do you think you should increase or decrease things?  If you haven’t made enough of a change, you can still get back on track by:

1. Re-Looking At Your Goal
2. Reconfigure Your Schedule To Accommodate Healthy Changes
3. Keep Up With Your New Plan
4. Increase Your goals or Adjust Your Goals To Be More Realistic (Achievable!)

If you feel as though you have made a positive change don’t forget to reward yourself!  Rewarding yourself doesn’t have to mean binge eating, there are other ways to splurge.

Reward Yourself By:

1. Extra Lounging Time (1 Hour/Week/Day/Etc)
2. An Extra Snack During The Week
3. Treat Yourself To A New Outfit, Shoes, Etc

Have fun being an active pet-parent and live a healthy lifestyle.  Your dog will thank you for that and you will love the new you!  And don’t forget to start thinking about next year!  Being healthy is a continuous process.  Good luck, I know YOU CAN DO IT!

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