Friend of the blog Alex Boross-Harmer was on CP24 on Wednesday morning doing pushups and promoting The Push Up Challenge, an initiative to do 2000 pushups (or alternative movements) between February 5 and 28, to raise money and awareness for mental health.
The mental health of Canadians is worse than before the pandemic, and stats show that only one in three Canadians who need mental health care can receive it. The pushup challenge is raising money for the Canadian Mental Health Association, but is also reminding people that movement, community, fun and purpose are key factors in reducing stress and improving mental health.
Blogger Nicole and I have both signed up for the challenge. Well, Nicole is organized and trained for it. I signed up when Alex reminded us in a group chat on Monday that they were going to be on TV doing pushups.
Here’s Nicole’s description of her intentions and plan:
A gym acquaintance put out a call to join their team for this year’s Push-up Challenge, in support of Canadian Mental Health Association (CMHA). I was immediately intrigued for a couple reasons. I am aware of CMHA’s good work through my own work and through friends who work there and I remember when they participated in the challenge last year. I am very happy to support CMHA and any way that we can find resources for better mental health support. I am also pretty good at push-ups. I am not sure I will be able to do 87 full push-ups a day to reach my goal of 2000 for the month, but I am confident I can do a large chunk of them and the challenge allows you to supplement full push-ups with variations (hello eccentric push-ups) or other movements. I can report about my success at the end of the month. For me, posting about a positive challenge is a much-needed distraction in this time of constant, stressful news, for which I feel a bit powerless to respond effectively. I can do push-ups and try to support a worthy mental health agency.
Here is the link to Nicole’s donation page: https://www.thepushupchallenge.ca/fundraiser/nicoleplotkin
As for me, I really don’t think it will be good for me to go from 0 to 90 in the pushup department in one day, so I’m going to mix it up with squats and assisted pushups of various kinds. (One time I did like 80 pushups without warning and cause havoc in my chest muscles to the point I thought I was having a heart attack. Good times!).
I’ve been “training” for two days now (as in, I do 10 pushups every time I think about it) and I’m psyched. You all know how much I love counting things, and I particularly love it when I can poke an app when I’m counting. Apparently there are different goals for every day, relating to stats about mental health and ideas about how to support each other.
Join us, or sponsor us — my fundraising link is here
