Exercise and Aging
Exercise is one of the most important activities we can perform to keep us looking and feeling healthy. As we age our bodies need to be kept in shape. Exercise is the best way to make sure we can enjoy our middle and later years.
Something all of us have to deal with as we get older is Sarcopenia, the age-related loss of skeletal muscle. Because of this, we need to be concerned about our continued ability to perform our daily work and household tasks. Dealing with Sarcopenia is a task for all of us that wish to be strong and healhy as we age.
What happens to us over the years is that slowly muscle mass is lost. We may even weigh the same as we did twenty or thirty years ago but we have a much higher proportion of fat on our bodies. Eventually this muscle loss makes everything we do more difficult. This is intensified when we diet and lose weight too rapidly or we don't exercise while we lose.
Simply put, with the loss of muscle everything we do gets harder: driving a car, getting up from a chair, walking around the block, climbing stairs or lifting packages. I'm sure you have noticed older people having difficulty performing even the most basic tasks.
What To Do
Being physically active and exercising is the best way to combat Sarcopenia. We don't need to become athletes to stop the loss of muscle mass. But we need to perform different types of exercise to make sure our muscular system is maintained.
Resistance exercise is crucial. Purchasing two light dumbells may be the best investment you make. There are also rubber exercise bands you can buy at a sports shop. You can even use household objects to start with, such as books or soup cans. For the more motivated, a low cost exercise bench is a great investment. To be effective, the exercise has to be progressive. This means that when the weight you are using begins to feel lighter you increase the weight. There are many good books on lifting weights as well as many helpful web sites.
Resistance exercise lowers your blood pressure, improves balance, increases your metabolism, and, of course, strenghtens your muscles, bones and ligaments.
It is important to note that resistance exercise is also very important for postmenopausal women. Lifting weights increases bone density. As we age we tend to lose our sense of balance and fall more often. Keeping the bones and muscles strong helps us maintain our balance, fall less often and resist bone fracture if we do fall.
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