7 Ways to Ensure Your Family Stays Safe and Active at Home During COVID-19

The coronavirus pandemic has caused stress, anxiety, and safety and health concerns throughout the country in 2020. As we settle into the new year, it’s important to continue following health guidelines to ensure our families stay healthy. Here are a few ways to go about ensuring this safety while at home.

Stay Home as Much as Possible

It’s best to stay home as much as possible during the pandemic. Aside from going to work, grocery shopping, and necessary medical appointments, staying home and limiting contact with others is the best way to ensure your family’s safety and health.

Have Your House Inspected

As you spend more time in your home, you may consider having your home inspected to ensure all is well. Typically, your roof should be inspected once or twice a year. You also may consider mold, fungus, rodent, and termite services as well as electrical, HVAC, and plumbing inspections. If you suspect water damage or structural issues with your house, you may want to get those checked out, too. Being home requires a safe, livable house or apartment.

Find Fun Projects and Activities to do at Home

Spending a lot of time at home can get quite boring, so you and your family may consider compiling a list of activities you’d like to accomplish at home in 2021. What could be included on this list? Here are some examples of home projects and activities your family can tackle:

• Finish the basement
• Reorganize the kitchen
• Paint the stairs
• Paint a mural
• Build shelves
• Redo a bedroom or two
• Create wall decor
• Handmake a picture holder

This list can go on and on depending on your family’s interests. Attempting to complete a handful of projects to do each month is a great way to get in some quality family time as well as make some possible upgrades to your home. Allow your family to be creative and have fun!

Exercise and Eat Healthy at Home

Along with finding fun ways to occupy your family’s time at home, it’s also important to remain healthy physically. How can your family get exercise into your daily routines? Here are some ideas:

• Try beginner yoga videos as a family
• Go swimming in your pool
• Play basketball in your driveway
• Pass the soccer ball in your backyard
• Play a game of catch outside
• Set up weights and mats in your basement to work out
• Find simple workout videos online to follow
• Go for runs and walks in your neighborhood as well as local parks and trails

There are so many ways to be physically active while being stuck indoors and unable to go to the gym. Aside from working out, healthy eating is important, too. Cut down on purchasing unhealthy snacks and sweets. Instead, find healthy snack alternatives that everyone in your family will enjoy. Be sure vegetables and fruits are incorporated into your family’s diets each day. Instead of making cookies and cupcakes and munching on chips, make veggie trays, fruit-based muffins, smoothies, and yogurt parfaits, and purchase veggie-based chips as an alternative to potato chips.

Be Aware of and Properly Manage Mental Health

While physical health is important, it’s also essential to keep your mental health in check, too. Many people have been struggling with anxiety, depression, and other mental health issues during the pandemic. To ensure proper mental health management, have open family discussions about everyone’s fears, worries, and frustrations. Encourage everyone to write in a journal and to take time for themselves. Exercising, eating healthy, staying connected with family and friends digitally, and utilizing time to take on some fun and new projects around the house are great ways to pass the time during the pandemic while keeping everyone’s mental health in check.

Avoid Contact With the Elderly

To ensure the safety and health of elderly family members, avoid contact with them at all costs. When it comes to the senior population, 20% of adults believe the health care system was not prepared and properly equipped to care for them. This seems to be apparent during the pandemic, as elderly people are more likely to become severely sick and even pass away from the coronavirus.

Avoiding contact and making sure your elderly parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles stay home is essential for their health especially. Offer to drop off groceries and other necessities, and say hello from a distance. If they take part in a Medicaid funded caregiver program, you can get paid for it. Each state has different rules and regulations regarding these programs. For instance, the CDPAP NYC program allows patients to hire family and friends to care for them. Utilize apps and smart technology to video chat, text, send pictures, and otherwise check in every now and then. It’s important for elderly people to have social interactions while they’re home, so be sure to distantly communicate often.

Follow Health Guidelines

Following health guidelines is essential during the pandemic. Almost 1,000 people become part of Florida’s population every day. With so many people traveling from state to state and even country to country, it’s best to stay home and follow health and safety protocols to avoid dangerous and unhealthy situations.

As the pandemic continues, it’s important to stay healthy as well as take care of ourselves and one another while following health guidelines. Stay home and find ways to healthily and productively utilize your time.