Exercise for the disabled
WFTV.com has a very important article on exercising and the disabled. There are many able bodied folks that just sit in front of the TV and eat. They don’t care about their health or weight. If you are stuck in a wheelchair, it can be a big issue trying to get proper exercise. Add problems with your arms and it can be almost impossible to get the proper aerobic exercise that your heart needs. This article talks about several things you can do in a wheelchair to increase the mobility and strength of your arms as well as get the ole ticker going. Plus, there are computers that can electrically stimulate your leg muscles to run an exercise bike and get your heart rate up and dramatically increase blood flow to the legs. All of these are critical for all of us to have long and healthy lives. Allowing yourself to slip makes it harder to work and get things done. Don’t just sit there and allow your muscles to atrophy to nothing.
Exercising is one of the best ways to handle pain and increase strength to move around. There is a lot you can do with your arms using small weights which can protect them from constant pushing your wheelchair around. There are two things you need to always keep in mind:
1) Try to get the most strength out of an exercise. It should not be too easy or you will not get anything out of it.
2) Make sure you do not hurt yourself. Over extending yourself is an excellent way to tear a muscle or a tendon. Then you have to take it easy until t hat heals which can slow down your exercise program.
Also make sure that any rehab training you are doing is safe. I was transferred to a trainee with no other instructors around and he ended up tearing both of my rotator cups. Don’t let this happen to you. If the pain is increasing to the point that you are having a hard time pushing through, stop regardless of what the instructor says. It is your body and any mistakes they make you have to live with. It should be a little tough to move the weights around, but not a massive strain. Repetitive moves will help most for cardiac exercise to get the blood moving. Unless you are trying to gain bulk in yoiur arms it make sense to do lots of repetitions with small weights. This will give you a lean body and good tone. This is something that we could all use.
The third big thing is food. Don’t get into eating non-stop at McDonalds or Burger King. These are high fat foods that were never designed to be lived off of and will make it difficult to lose all that weight. THis is on top of any weight that is gained because of the myriad of drugs we take to stay alive. There are many drugs that have increased weight as a contra-indication. Try to eat healthy foods that are easy to digest, especially for those on pain killers. Pain Killers dramatically slow down the bowel and can cause all kinds of medical problems. Try to eat things that will help the bowel move including prunes, prune juice or any high fiber fruit. Also try to reduce the spicy food as that can cause hemmorrhoids that are hard to shrink and are painful to deal with.
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Zoran