Sixty-Plus and Fit Again by Rosenberg Magda;Rossman I. M.D.;Wilson Hoke;

Author:Rosenberg, Magda;Rossman, I., M.D.;Wilson, Hoke;
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781590775158
Publisher: M. Evans & Company
Published: 2015-09-29T00:00:00+00:00

Remember to sit properly, with shoulders and buttocks against the back of the chair (and avoid soft, overstuffed chairs, which are luxuries our spines can’t afford).

Awareness is important. Be aware of your posture while you are sitting, standing, or walking. It does no good to make a joint flexible, or a muscle strong, if you defeat the purpose of exercise by slouching and drooping for the remaining hours of the day.

Your Capacity for Exercise

Everyone has a different capacity for exercise. No standard applies to all of us. The daily minimum that is right for you must be measured by your physical capabilities, the point at which you reach exhaustion, your rate of breathing, and your pulse rate.

The simplest way to determine your capacity for exercise is to judge when you start breathing heavily after an exercise like walking. If it takes only minutes to make you breathe hard, your capacity is low, so when you begin doing exercises, you should limit yourself to only a few minutes a day.

For both muscle-toning and flexibility exercises, you will have to discover what your capacity is. It’s dangerous, for example, to overdo muscle-toning exercises. You could be bedridden for weeks if you don’t follow directions and listen to your body. A muscle that hasn’t been used for years is sick, and unless you treat it with loving care, as you try to get it back into shape, the result could be serious.

An unused muscle can be brought back to life, even after years of disuse. It needs to be used steadily and slowly, however, to bring it back to health.

Start by working each set of muscles for no longer than two minutes a day for the first few weeks. Muscles don’t hurt while you are exercising them. The reaction to waking up those tired muscles and putting them to work usually comes the day after you start. That’s when you might feel some aches and pains. But you’ll be defeating your purpose, and possibly harming yourself, if you overdo your exercises the first weeks of a program. Don’t let enthusiasm run away with you. There’s nothing to be gained from a day’s strenuous exercise followed by three days in bed to recover.

Start off with a few minutes of exercise, and then wait until the next day to see your body’s reaction to the workout. If you have no reaction—no sore muscles or stiffness—go ahead with the groups of exercises outlined in later chapters, extending your time by a minute for each one. Each day tone the muscles and exercise your joints a little longer, judging how much you can do by your body’s reaction the next day. If you are very stiff and sore, don’t increase your time, but don’t be too easy on yourself.

You can never go wrong by starting off very slowly and paying attention to your body’s signals. Of course, if at any time during exercise you find that it is painful or exhausting, sit down and relax. You have probably reached your limit, and if there is much pain, you should see your doctor.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.