SPEAKER_01 0:15

Welcome to Practically Fit, Real Fitness Over 40. I'm Alex Johnson. And again, Jen Chamberlain is off this week attending her sister's wedding. So this week on the podcast, I'll be talking about working out with your spouse or romantic partner. Is it a good idea? Can it make your relationship stronger? Can it help motivate you to reach your fitness goals? And do spouses or romantic partners make the best fitness friends? But I'm not going to do this episode alone. In fact, who better to talk about this subject with me than my wife, Abby? Abby, welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_00 0:50

Thanks, Alex.

SPEAKER_01 0:51

Yeah, so this is you've done some podcasts before. You work in HR. Uh doing a fitness podcast is a little bit different than doing an HR podcast.

SPEAKER_00 1:00

Yeah, I guess so, although it's still talking about something that I'm very passionate about. So all good.

SPEAKER_01 1:07

Today on the show, we'll answer the questions I mentioned at the top, plus share some of our practical tips for working out with your romantic partner or spouse. And this is something we've had a lot of experience with over the past few years. For us, fitness is an important part of our lives. And honestly, one of the reasons why we fell in love. So I think, you know, when we got together, we both had fitness as kind of one of the top things that we were looking for in a spouse, right? As in somebody who we could be active with in whatever form that takes.

SPEAKER_00 1:39

Yeah, no, that's absolutely right. In fact, I think it was uh on both of our dating profiles, not only in terms of within the text, but also in terms of the photos, but definitely one of the reasons why we were attracted to each other and why we gelled so well together. And actually part of our early dating history was taking long walks together, taking a bike ride together, going hiking. So definitely a weave through our relationship.

SPEAKER_01 2:09

Yeah, that and we also had IPA on the dating profile on Bumble as well. So let's talk about this topic. First, let's talk about what the research says. And I want to start off talking about how fitness might impact your overall relationship. I found an article on psychology today called Why Couples Should Work Out Together. And it actually cites a 2021 study from the Journal of Personal and Social Relationships titled, Quote, Better Together: The Impact of Exercising with a Romantic Partner. I actually wanted to read the source article from this journal, but the cost to do so was $437, which we run into from time to time on the show. So I'm actually grateful that someone summarized the article for me in the Psychology Today article. So this study was actually a study of nearly 100 college students. So not quite in our age group, right, Abby. But they they exercise, you know, on a consistent basis with their romantic partners. And the data of the folks in the study was gathered through a survey, through daily reports for two weeks, and interviews after the study was complete. And so beyond asking the couples about their exercise habits, the researchers asked them about things like mood and relationship satisfaction. And the Psychology Today article summarizes this quite well. It says, quote, exercising together with a romantic partner was associated with greater positive mood during exercise, beyond the happiness boost that results from the exercise itself, and correlated with higher positive mood during the day. Lastly, it was related to greater relationship satisfaction. So, Abby, in hearing this study, how do you feel about this? Have you noticed these things when we work out together? Like, do you feel like our moods are better? Uh, we get a happiness boost. Does it have a positive impact on our relationship?

SPEAKER_00 3:59

I absolutely think it does. Not only in terms of sharing that time together and doing something that's both active and engaging, also in terms of being there to support one another. And it's just a different way of supporting. So it gives a richness. I'm also impressed that there were 100 college students who had a romantic partner and spouse for a study.

SPEAKER_01 4:24

Yeah, I know, I know, right? I found that kind of humorous as well. And I will say on the whole, like I've noticed the same things you've noticed. Um, and we'll and we'll talk about this in our tips later. Sometimes you might have like a momentary negative thing go on when you're working out together. But on the whole, you know, I find it to be a very important and meaningful part of our relationship. And really, I think something that I envisioned, like I said, when I was looking for a partner, I thought this might be important. And, you know, so far as the experiment of our lives has gone, you know, not an official scientific study, but I think it has a massive impact on us on a day-to-day basis. So for me, I think if you were asking me my opinion on this beyond what this research study says, yes, I think, you know, working out with your partner makes your relationship better to a pretty large degree.

SPEAKER_00 5:16

Yeah, then the other thing I would say, which I think we've both experienced, is taking on something that your partner does that you hadn't done before. And it can then be less scary. So for example, Alex lifts weights. I've never done that before in my life. So I've started to do that. And to have somebody who's been there done it, who I trust to walk me through that makes a massive difference, and and vice versa. You know, I've got Alex into trail running recently, something he hadn't done before. So I think it's really nice because you can explore different things together and learn those together, and you can't weave that into your whole family life and the way that you are. You know, we spend a lot of time outdoors, we like being outdoors, and so that weaves into weekends away and holidays and so on. So I think it's it is it's just a different way of enriching across our relationship.

SPEAKER_01 6:13

Yeah, and I think I think it's important too because it does put you in situations where you're spending time together, which is important for couples, and you do have a lot of time if you're out going for a run or a bike ride, um, even though it's kind of windy on bike rides sometimes, and we we say, What? I can't hear you, but it it does give you time to talk, right? And so it really, I think, in a way, can enhance your communication in your relationship as well. So fitness is pretty awesome in terms of enhancing the relationship. Now, you mentioned doing new things together, and I think that's a nice segue to the next subject here, which is can working out with your romantic partner help you reach your fitness goals? And so guess what? I found another study about this. This one dates all the way back to 1995 when I was still in my formative years, and it's titled 12-month adherence of adults who joined a fitness program with a spouse versus without a spouse. So this was a 12-month study. This was a long-term study that looked to, quote, determine adherence of apparently healthy adults who joined an exercise program with a spouse, which they've labeled married pairs versus without a spouse, which they labeled married singles. It was, quote, hypothesized that married pairs would have a significantly higher adherence than married single singles, and that self-motivation would be associated with adherence, unquote. So they basically got a group of married people, started a workout program, and there were couples, married couples that were going together, and then other married people who were not doing this program with their spouse, which they called the married singles. So they wanted to find out would working out as a married pair uh make you stick with the workout program? And guess what? Married pairs had a significantly higher attendance and lower dropout rate than married singles, which appeared to be primarily influenced by spousal support rather than self-motivation. So, in other words, in this study, the couples that worked out together stuck with the exercise. And Abby, I think this is something that we've noticed in working out together that we keep each other motivated to work out even on days when maybe we don't want to.

SPEAKER_00 8:22

Absolutely. And I think it comes back to a couple of things that you've talked about on the podcast before. One is that accountability buddy. So, you know, if the other person's relying on you or expecting you to be there to support them to go out on a ride or go out on a run, you're more likely to stick with it. And I think that's really true for us. The other is um competitiveness. Myself and Alex may be a little bit competitive. So the idea of him logging more miles than me and me not keeping up will always spur in my competitive side. So I think there's a real you know balance there across those different items, and I see that definitely being the case. And and sometimes you do need to have someone to give you a little push and what better person than the person that knows you the best.

SPEAKER_01 9:13

Right. We we even have our goals in Strava, and you know, if we're like one mile off of our goals, some of us will go out and do that one mile just to make sure that we achieve the goal. But and actually, I say some of us, I'm joking.

SPEAKER_00 9:27

He's he means him.

SPEAKER_01 9:28

Yeah. We're both very competitive about reaching those goals. So that's something for us that works really well together. Um, so that's what the research says about working out with your romantic partner. It can help increase the quality of your relationship. It can help you reach your fitness goals. So, how do you actually do this? What are the best ways for you and your partner to approach exercise together? I think this is something especially relevant if maybe you've decided to start a new fitness program with your romantic partner or spouse. Uh, maybe you haven't worked out together before. Uh, you really want to think about that before you start doing it, uh, before you dive in. Uh, and we've had our kind of fair share of successes and a few pitfalls along the way. And so we'll share some tips with you uh now around that and some of our stories. So, Abby, why don't you start us off with the tips?

SPEAKER_00 10:18

Sure. So, first I think you don't have to do the same activity together, or you don't have to do the same activity in the same way. So, if we go back to weight training, there's no way I can weight train in the same way that Alex does. I can't lift as heavy as he does, and I've not been doing it for as long as he has, so I don't have the same form, but I can work out at the same time as him. And in fact, we do. Like we have our at-home gym in our garage, and so we will go out there, put on some music and work out at the same time, but we'll be doing different activities. Maybe you know, maybe I'm doing uh arms workout with dumbbells, and he's doing 7,000 pull-ups or whatever he's doing. But that's it's still really great because we're still working out together and we really enjoy it. Like um, I've been known to dance around the garage in between my sets, uh, just to amuse Alex. Um, so you don't have to be doing this exactly the same thing at exactly the same time. I think you still get that motivation boost and that connection by working out together at the same time. And and the same in terms of other activities that we that we might do together. For example, Alex can run a lot faster than I can. Um, so I can't keep his pace if he's going to go at his fast pace. I wouldn't be able to keep stride with him. Um, so equally kind of second tip would be sometimes you can do things separate. We might both go for a run on the same day, but do it separately from one another and then cheer each other's run on because my great pace is not the same as Alex's great pace. And also one of the things that I've learned for myself, and this is when it's important to understand yourself, is I struggle running with somebody else who's faster than me because I try and keep up with them and then I burn myself out. So I actually run a much better pace when I'm not running with him than when I'm running with him. So it that's okay. It's okay to do those activities separate, but support and celebrate one another.

SPEAKER_01 12:30

Yeah, I think those are great points. Um, and you know, I think it you mentioned working out in the garage together, and we love doing that. Like, that's the great thing about having a gym at home, right? So, this we could we could update my newsletter post from several months ago about 18 reasons to have a home gym. We could make it 19 because you can work out with your spouse in the comfort of your own home and dance in the garage and not be embarrassed around gym weirdos. But also, I think, too, in that same vein, like the point about you don't have to do the same activity or in the same way. Um, you can go to the gym together if if you belong to a gym or want to join a gym, because that can be very motivating for some people. And you know, one of you can go on the treadmill and one of you can lift weights, like that's another example of the same concept at work.

SPEAKER_00 13:17

Uh the other tip that we have talked about is if you're going to work out together, maybe to set some ground rules.

SPEAKER_01 13:25

We Yeah, I think I think this is an important one. So this is our second tip, and um setting setting ground rules can be important. This is one of the things I was referring to when I said, you know, we've had a few pitfalls along the way. And again, I think ground rules for working out together, uh, especially again if you're doing that same activity together, are going to be unique to every couple. So for us, I can give you some examples. Uh cycling is something that we do together quite often, probably three times a week, right? Like we cycle together in the evening or the morning when it's not hot in Texas. Uh, and we have we have ground rules around that. Like, one of them is that we won't leave each other behind. The only time that, like, so Abby knows me well and she knows that I like to go up hills very fast. Like, that's one of the things I like about cycling is the challenge of climbing the hills. So, like, we did a ride yesterday and there were several big hills. And, you know, I'll go up the hills at my own pace, but I always wait for her at the at the top of the hill, right? So, uh, and so that's like sometimes if I'm feeling really good, like I want to try to challenge the my PR or challenge the time on the leaderboards and Strava, but we know that about each other, and we set that ground rule out ahead of time. We also set out who's directing the route because um this is a more recent ground rule that we've developed because that's where we've had some conflicts in the past. Like we're both very strong personalities.

SPEAKER_00 14:53

Like, I'm a big route planner, whereas I think you like to sometimes I like to point my bike and see where it will take me. Right. Life's an adventure.

SPEAKER_01 15:04

So so that could be a challenge, right? Because in my head, I've like drawn out this map for where we're going to go. And then, like, if she wants to deviate from the map, or if I literally have the map on my bike computer, like it's caused a few conflicts in the past. So now when we start out the ride, we're very deliberate about like, okay, who's who's leading the route today? Are we following a map? Are we just kind of going where the bike takes us? And I think this is something where we had like repeated little issues with it over the past couple of years. Since we've been doing this, like we haven't had that conflict anymore, uh, which has been really great.

SPEAKER_00 15:38

Yeah, and especially in something like cycling or or running the same. You know, you do need somebody to lead the ride or the or the run. So having that person who is leading and then you're following the directions of them. For me, it's important. If you're both trying to do it, it gets it gets confusing. And uh, at least this way we know who's in charge and we can alternate between us in terms of that role. Um, and it means that we have a bit of variety because we'll probably will take people we we would take each other in on different routes than we would do for ourselves. So it's nice to like mix things up.

SPEAKER_01 16:17

Yeah, so I'd really highlight this one for those of you who are considering working out together as a couple for the first time. Set your ground rules, and again, those are going to be unique to you. But think about things like pacing. Will you stay together during the whole activity? If you're outdoors doing something like a run or a hike or a bike ride, if you're doing strength training, will you do the same types of weights? Those things are really important to set out ahead of time because it can avoid any conflict and keep you to that happy place that's mentioned in that study and keep exercise so that it's contributing in a positive way to your relationship. Uh so one more tip, and this is the final one, and that's listen to your partner, but also don't hesitate to push them. So this is something, again, that comes down to knowing your partner really well. Uh, you may be out, for example, doing some sort of exercise. We mentioned cycling or going on a run. Um, there may be a day when, like, hey, you just realize you need to back off on the effort level or the distance that you're doing or whatever, because your partner just doesn't have it that day. And it happens to all of us. Sometimes we get out and we're doing a physical activity and one of us feels a lot better than the other. And you know, it's that's just a day when we need to back off. But then sometimes, you know, in this busy world that we live in with work and things like that, where we're stressed out, you can have a day where maybe you need that little extra bit of motivation, and that's where your partner can come in and push you. And this has happened to both of us, I think, for example, on bike rides, where you know, we've been out and like I remember one several months ago where I felt kind of, you know, I didn't feel well in that day. It was probably related to being on the screen all day at work. I just sort of felt disoriented when we went out for the ride. And I remember being like a mile in thinking, like, I'm gonna turn around, I'm gonna go home. Like, you know, I was already in like a very negative headspace, and you kind of encouraged me in a positive way, and it kept me going. And then by the end of the ride, I'm like, oh wow, I actually, number one, I feel much better after doing the activity and not just being stuck indoors, and B, like, I wouldn't have felt that way if you hadn't pushed me. So um, I think again, this comes down to knowing your partner, knowing their limits, and being able to kind of judge if they really are not feeling well that day or if they need that extra little bit of motivation. But uh yeah, sometimes you do you can help them out by pushing them just that little extra bit, and it works out quite well in the end for both of you.

SPEAKER_00 18:49

I couldn't agree more with this. I think there's lots of occasions where we've experienced this, and it does absolutely come down to like the person who knows you the best, so they know if you are really in a space where you where you can't push on, or whether you're just in that negative mindset and you need to be pushed, push along. So I can think of a couple of times uh not long ago, we were out for a run, it was hot, and I really struggled in the heat. I was born in England, not raised to run in these kind of temperatures. So, but Alex pushed me to keep going, and we got to four miles, we were training for a race, so having that motivation of that we needed to keep going, and I felt great by the end. The other one that I would bring up as an example was um I introduced Alex to skiing, and we were skiing in Santa Fe, and he did not want to come down a run that we had gone up, but I knew he could do it, I knew that he would be okay, and he had just put himself in this mindset of I can't do it, and he was looking down the mountain, looking at the gradient. And I know from when I learned to ski, that's super scary. You look down and you think that's way too steep, I can't do it, and just like breaking it down into segments. And I said to him, I'm gonna get you down this mountain, just follow me, trust me. And I don't think somebody else would have been able to do that in the same way with him necessarily. Like he does trust me, and he knew that I wasn't gonna put him into danger and that I would get him down. And I know he felt great by the time we got to the bottom of the mountain, probably even better by the time we had an IPA in hand.

SPEAKER_01 20:26

Yeah, that was that's a great example. Uh, and I think that's actually happened a couple of times now when we've been skiing. Um, the first time we went, and again, I've been learning, and Abby's an experienced skier, and I'll I recall that I actually quit on a lesson because the the instructor just had a very laissez-faire form of instruction, I would term it. Like he just took a bunch of us beginner skiers up to a bit steeper run, and they were all just sort of like bombing down without a care. But I guess, you know, I'm a very cautious person to an ex in some ways, and I just was like, I can't go down that. I literally quit on the lesson, and I think I texted you or called you from the slope, and you came and helped me get down that one. Uh, and that was the first time that happened. Then the second time you mentioned in Santa Fe, where yeah, it was I I had had really good lessons uh that day and I wanted to put it into action, so you took me up there, and then when I see I think it was only for those of you who ski, it was a blue run, which is like the second level of difficulty. Green is the easiest, then it goes blue and black and so on. And uh so I was uh I was a bit nervous about it and like almost refusing to go down. And you're absolutely right. If it had been anyone else, like I don't think they would have got me down uh the slope. So yeah, this is where a great example of how you can push your partner sometimes to motivate them in the realm of fitness. So those are our tips on working out with a spouse. We hope that you're able to put those into action, especially again if you're starting up a new workout program with your romantic partner. And I think in this discussion today, you know, talking through this, we've learned a lot about how working out with a spouse can be beneficial to both your fitness and your relationship. So that's what I think is so cool about this. Based on the research, spouses really can make the best fitness friends, but also fitness can contribute to making a positive impact on your relationship. So hope you've enjoyed the discussion today. Thanks, Abby, for coming on the podcast on short notice and being uh a guest on the show. I really appreciate it. And uh hope that everyone enjoyed this episode. As always, head on over to practically.fit, check out uh our latest newsletter content. We've got some great content out there. You can put your email address in and you'll get weekly content from both me and from Jen. Of course, you can also comment on the podcast, share your stories about working out with your uh loved one, your fitness friend, your spouse. You can do that on the podcast over at practically. And if you have questions or stories, please feel free to email me, alex at practically. But thanks for listening, as always, and until next time, remember, fitness is for everybody.