Nurturing Versus Abusive Exercises By Robert Klapper, MD & Lynda Huey, MS Find this article at the AEA website with a supple- mental How to Agercise: How to Exercise for Your Age chart. Login as a member, go to Members Only, and click on Akwa Extra. Does your favorite workout or sport cause you pain? Does the pain go away when you cut back on your recreational activities? You may have to choose your sports and workouts with more consideration for the sore areas of your body. Let’s look at how you can learn to limit the abusive activities and start to cross-train with nurturing ones that won’t aggravate your body. Exercise comes in two flavors: nurturing and abusive. The sports that people love most—running, basketball, ten- nis, skiing, racquetball, and football—abuse the body’s weight-bearing joints, whereas water exercise, bicycling, elliptical machines, Tai Chi, mat Pilates, and therapeutic yoga remove impact from the weight-bearing joints and are therefore nurturing. Most people don’t consider the abusive- ness of their exercise routines until pain or physical limita- tion strikes. At that point, they pay attention. Our hope is that you’ll begin nurturing exercises on a regular basis. By using safe forms of exercise most of the time to maintain and enhance fitness, you may be able to participate in your beloved sports and activities on an occasional basis for years to come. Since you are reading Akwa, you’re probably already fully acquainted water exercise. That’s great. You won’t need much convincing. But you may need to be nudged a bit regarding the other activities you do that can start to become abusive as the body ages. First, critically look at your lifestyle, your play, and your family commitments; consider deleting what we believe is abusive exercise. Pain is your guide. Stop harmful activities when your body whispers to you with a slight pain. Don’t wait for your body to shout at you. By then it is too late. Now is the time to real- ize that you must take responsibility for any aches or pains you have. Learn what exercise your body responds to with- 30 | Akwa | December 2017 / January 2018 out discomfort. You may love bicycling, but discover that the biking movement causes a pinching feeling in the front of your hip. Try Pilates and yoga, or discover other activities of your own choosing. Or you may learn that you enjoy body boarding, and you feel terrific all over when you get out of the ocean. It’s up to you to find what fits your lifestyle, your personal tastes, and most important what your body likes. Your body gets the final vote. As much as you like an activity or sport, if it causes pain, then cross that one off your list. A Successful Transition to Nurturing Activities It’s time to get serious about making a successful transition to your nurturing activities. You’ve grown to love certain sports and activities throughout your lifetime because these activi- ties give you the most satisfaction and pleasure. You’ve got- ten good at the details of your game or fitness regimen, and it won’t be easy to walk away from that vital part of your life. You will go through a transition time while your mind and body adapt to the new movements and environments. Do Six Workouts Without Evaluating When I work with elite athletes who are coming back after injury, I always tell them, “Just put your head down and do six workouts. Don’t look up until we’ve finished them. Then we’ll see how you’re doing.” Apply this same logic to your new program of moving from abusive to nurturing activities. Do six pool or bicycling workouts without judging anything. Once you feel that you’re mastering the new skills and creating the specific strength needed, you’ll feel an increase in your affin- ity for your new activity. Soon you’ll be finding mental meaning and inner purpose in your physical movements just as you did with your previous activities. —Lynda Huey
