6 Easy Ways to Get Healthy and Strong During a Community Quarantine

As the coronavirus takes over our lives, we’re now faced with a new normal. We’ve withdrawn into our homes, only heading out to get the essentials — food, medicine, and money.

Now, whether you’ve grown restless at the lack of social interaction or you’ve started to claim social distancing as your love language, the enhanced community quarantine is our reality and the best thing we can do right now is to own it. In fact, it’s a great time to get used to spending time at home and taking care of ourselves, especially when our best defense against the stealth coronavirus is a strong immune system. We need to be at our healthiest so that if it does hit, our bodies can fight it off just like it would the flu.

So, what do you do to get healthy when the gym is closed and you’re faced with all the food you’ve stocked up on? I give you six of them.



1. Work out regularly
Exercising has many, MANY health benefits, both immediate and long-term. Essentially, what it does for us is it delivers oxygen and nutrients across the body and helps the heart and the rest of the cardiovascular system work more efficiently. The Mayo Clinic recommends at least 30 minutes of exercise daily to boost general health and 300 minutes or more per week for weight-loss and strengthening. Whatever your mood is, from yoga to HIIT, you can always turn to YouTube to show you how.



2. Eat healthy
Food is medicine! So, step away from the chips, the canned goods, the soda, and everything else you know is bad for you. The fad diet you’re on (keto, paleo, master cleanse, etc.) isn’t going to be of much help to you at this point either. It won’t give you the right balance of nutrients. Instead, fill your plate with color and pile up on different kinds of fruits and vegetables. They have all the vitamins and minerals you need in a day to get your mind and body functioning like clockwork — the makings of a strong immune system. You may also want to switch the coffee up for some green tea or chamomile tea to get your fill of antioxidants. Take this time away from the convenience of dining out as an opportunity to get used to preparing a healthy home-cooked meal from scratch.



3. Ditch the vices
I’m not even going to tell you how bad smoking is for you. The pack itself says so. But, with all routine and stressors out the window during this lockdown, you control your environment now. It’s probably the least difficult time for your to kick the habit. Even more if you live in a condo and have to step out for a puff. Even, even more if you have kids at home!

Next stop, alcohol. The story here is that drinking gives your body more work to do. It focuses on metabolizing that first because your body doesn’t store alcohol. That keeps it away from doing the other important processes. Apart from that, there’s no saying what kind of accident you could get yourself into while intoxicated. Our health workers are busy enough as it is. I’m sure you don’t want to add to their work. Let’s keep the alcohol to the rubbing kind, shall we?



4. Keep a clean home
Having a clean home has a lot more benefits than we think. It leaves fewer places for bacteria to grow and less corners for rodents that are carrying dangerous parasites to hide. It relieves allergy and asthma symptoms, the latter being a condition that makes someone more vulnerable to ‘rona. It also reduces your stress because you’re not bothered regularly by something that needs fixing. That’s important, too, because prolonged stress can weaken your immune system and eventually take its toll on your heart.



5. Get enough sleep
You may find yourself having too much energy at night and not being able to sleep early. That’s another reason why you should exercise, to tire you out and help you sleep soundly at night. Sleep heals everything! It lets your body regenerate, it improves your physical performance, it helps regulate your appetite, it gives your heart and blood vessels a bit of a rest lowering your blood pressure. We all wish we hadn’t taken it for granted when we were younger and ECQ is our chance to make up for it. Shoot for 7-8 hours of Zs each night for peak health benefits.



6. Maintain good hygiene
This is basic but still worth pointing out. Good hygiene is absolutely crucial to good overall health. Even if you live alone or live with people who accept you no matter what you do (or don’t do), still cover your mouth when you cough or sneeze, wash your hands regularly, take a bath daily, and brush your teeth. Yes, that last one is still important. In fact, you should be the standard bearer in keeping bacteria away.

There really is no better time than now to start boosting your immune system and getting stronger. What's great is that with the help of the internet, you have all the resources you need to pull it off. Follow these six basic tips and you’ll be amazed how far you’ve come after the fourth week.