The streak ended today at 371.
In early 2018, our oldest daughter, Ashley (who's now a fourth-grade teacher), challenged Dad not only to be active when running but to consistently up his activity level by targeting 10,000 steps every day. The longest period of time that I'd knowingly done that was 3 days. Yup, 3. My weekly totals usually averaged out to 10,000 steps a day because of the longer runs I was taking, but my daily step count? Some days it wasn't even close. When Ashley challenged me, I was mindful, too, of research I'd read in recent years suggesting that even people like me who are avid runners/cyclists/swimmers can put our health at some degree of risk if we're largely sedentary during the many waking hours in which we're not engaged in those pursuits.
So, last October I decided to try going an entire month without missing a single day of hitting 10,000 steps. That turned into 2 months, 6, months, then, last week, I hit the 365-day mark, with a total of 6,017,028 steps—an average of 16,485 a day. Today I shut down the challenge to avoid getting obsessive about it, but it was fun making it to the 1-year mark. Along the way, I learned some valuable lessons that you may find helpful as you integrate wellness services into your client offerings as a physical therapist or physical therapist assistant:
