To be a healthy productive working mum, a great diet and a weekly exercise regime needs to be the cornerstone of your life.

Aim for 2-3 more intense exercise sessions a week and enjoy getting out for a walk on the days in between.

Eat regularly throughout the day to keep your energy levels up. From breakfast, to a mid-morning meal, lunch, afternoon tea, dinner and a late evening snack, each should contain plenty of fresh fruits and vegetables, a good low-fat source of protein (meat, eggs, dairy) and omega three fat supplements for brain function, joint and general health.

It’s best to kick-start the day by consuming a good source of protein, along with fruits and vegetables. A great way to do this is to have an omelette with mushrooms, tomatoes, capsicums and spinach or other dark leafy greens.

I like to make a large omelette for breakfast and eat half - and then have the other half for my morning tea. I make an omelette in 3 minutes, which is about as long as it takes to boil the kettle and make a cup of tea!  Or you can make it the night before and reheat in the microwave. You can vary the fillings from vegetables to fruits like blueberries and raspberries with a dash of cinnamon and yoghurt to make it super delicious! Try it. It’s yum!

The more brightly coloured and varied the fresh fruits and vegetables you eat, the less sluggish you will be. You will be getting fantastic nutritional content and lots of fibre. They are great for your metabolism! Try to eat your fruits and veggies, not juice them. It’s easy to consume too many calories when you drink juice and chewing them is better for us and again helps speed up our metabolism, as our body has to work hard to break them down for energy.

For lunch, I have plenty of salad or veggies – again, with tuna or chicken. For variety and to fill you up, try adding pumpkin or chickpeas to your salads.

If you want the best health and to have plenty of energy, steer clear of highly processed foods. Most foods that come in packets are highly processed and aren’t good for us. Eating too many of these leads to poor health, disease, poor quality sleep, etc.

For some dinners a week, I make up a big pot of bolognaise sauce or a savoury mince using low-fat mince meat, and make it differently each time, sometimes adding curry, peas and pumpkin. I ladle it over lots of delicious steaming broccoli and cauliflower. It’s much better for us, nutritionally, to have the veggies, rather than pasta, it’s lower in calories and packed with fibre and will give us a lot more energy and keep us nice and regular.

For the kids, I’ll add some pasta but make sure they get plenty of the veg too. I speak to my kids a lot about fuelling their bodies with nutritious food. It was hard getting them to eat veggies when they were younger, but seeing my husband and I eat them and knowing how good they are for them and the health that they will create in their bodies, they have made eating vegetables a habit.

Keeping your alcoholic drinks to a minimum each week will also help you to have a more productive week. I like to save mine for the weekends.

And remember to drink plenty of water everyday! Keep a jug of water on your desk and add some slices of lemon to it. Research shows that if we flavour our water we’ll drink more. Think of some low-calorie ways that you can do this. Drinking water helps speed up our metabolism and keeps us feel alert and energetic and helps deliver the nutrition we eat to all parts of our bodies.

Kirsten Jones is a Transformation Specialist at Metamorphosis Body Life Transformation. You can connect with her via Skype: kjchickstar2