New Year, Let's Exercise!

Exercise is another staple of New Year’s Resolutions. The benefits of exercise far outweigh the typical expectations of weight loss and really should be the goal instead of weight alone. While weight to a certain extent can be a marker for health, with exercise and proper diet, weight loss will usually occur. If weight loss does not despite best efforts, there are often underlying conditions complicating matters. However, exercise often works to help reduce those complicating factors as well. Let’s breakdown some of the important roles exercise plays in our mind and body.

• Blood Sugar – Consistent exercise improves blood sugar utilization and can improve your insulin levels. This is especially important for those with diabetes, pre-diabetes, and insulin resistance. Elevated blood sugar contributes to more than diabetes, it impacts our immune system, energy, sleep, and cardiac health.
• Heart Health – When you exercise your circulation and oxygen levels improve and your heart strengthens reducing your risk of heart disease. Your protective HDL cholesterol is supported by exercise, as is normal blood pressure levels.
• Cancer Risk – Many types of cancer show reduced risk of development with regular exercise.
• Mood/Sleep – Regular exercise improves your mood by producing endorphins and reducing stress levels. These benefits last through the night by improving your sleep as well. People who exercise also tend to be happier, with higher self-esteem.
• Strength – This may seem obvious, but exercise can make your muscles and bones stronger preventing falls and breaks while also improving your balance.
• Immune Support – Exercise increases the circulation of specialized immune system support cells while reducing inflammation in your body as well. Excess inflammation can not only make you feel unwell, but it can also increase likelihood of developing illnesses.
• Aging – Regular exercise reduces your risk of developing conditions commonly associated with aging including most chronic diseases, as well as cognitive (memory).

The above bullets are not an exhaustive list of benefits, but good reminders for why exercise is more important now than ever as we continue to trudge through a pandemic with physical and mental harm. It’s easy to acknowledge the benefits, the hard part is actually doing it. Here again the key is to find the exercise that’s right for YOU, not the exercise your Facebook friend or neighbor is promoting. The best exercise is the exercise you’ll stick with, consistency is necessary to achieve the benefits you’re looking for.

I’d be remiss to not encourage that while enjoying your exercise routine is important for longevity of a routine, a combination of cardio and strength training is really optimal, don’t just pick one leaving out the other. However, you don’t have to run marathons and become a body builder, just find ways to mix it up with movements that exercise your heart, while building some muscle. For women especially as we age muscle loss can more rapidly occur making health goals more difficult to attain, so don’t be afraid of some dumb bells and resistant bands!

Author

Teresa Spano