Tuesday, March 31, 2015

why i don't worry about "getting exercise"

EDIT:  synchronicitously, Dr. Sharma wrote this today:  http://www.drsharma.ca/adverse-metabolic-effects-of-exercise ....

****
Every diet-and-health resource from Conventional Wisdom through Atkins through hard-core paleo says you MUST "exercise."  Somehow whenever I hear the word "must" it just brings out the contrarian in me.

I'm going to be sixty in about three months.  I'm a woman.  A woman who lives in a three-story house (plus basement where the laundry facilities are), who does her own housework, who enjoys walking around the Missouri Botanical Garden in all seasons.  A woman who lifts her elderly dog every day, who carries around trunks of reenacting equipment regularly.

From an evolutionary point of view, how much "exercise" did my foremothers get that i'm lacking?  Probably not much.

Despite the data we see that post-menopausal women benefit from weightlifting, I can't help but suspect that these are people who rarely carry anything heavier than a purse ... however in my sister's case that can be a serious workout.  ;-) 

Reading The Old Way didn't impress me that this culture's women did an awful lot of sprinting or repetitive heavy-lifting.  They walked a lot, carried children and foraged foods back to camp, dug with sticks, .... Looks very similar to me shopping at Costco and other big-boxes, lugging groceries, and house-cleaning.  As a matter of fact, me carrying freshly-washed yardage from the washer/dryer to the sewing room is possibly more physically stressful, because i'm going up three flights of stairs with a laundry-basket held in front of me, whereas they're more likely to have used a better-balanced form of carrier. 

Want an effective whole-body workout?  Try scooping a lot of wet leaves out of the bottom of your swimming pool....

The work of modern every-day living can theoretically burn a lot of energy if you don't hire out the physical stuff to others.  It's just the details that change from a primitive lifestyle to ours -- I may not have to visit a spring or well to get my water (except at "Cowboy Town"), but I do get a case of fizzwater at the (far end of the) shop often, lift it multiple times, and carry it from car to kitchen.  They dig for tubers, I scrub the bathtub, sinks, showers and toilets.  They walk a couple of miles to where the tubers grow, I walk a couple of miles to where the artwork is displayed. 

Then there's yard-care and gardening:  stoop and walk, squat and pull, diiiiiiig, draw rake and broom, stoop some more, rinse, lather, repeat.

And all the criticism of SITTING that we've been hearing the past couple of years?  When I finish those chores I mentioned, I feel like I've earned the privilege of reclining with my feet up.

13 comments:

  1. That's understandable, given the description of your regular activities. I work, sitting at a desk, 8 waking hours a day. I need cardio exercise. I can't be too bothered to work up any gumption to lift heavy things (besides my purse that I dare not weigh...LOL). But I do try and get at least 30 minutes of dancing in, six days a week. But I totally get where you are coming from. The more 'always' or 'never' I hear, the more I, too, rebel. ;)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. :-D oh, that "always" and "never".... i tend to think our bodies dictate how much exercise we seek -- if we're overflowing with energy, it's easy to run around and hard to sit down. and when people suffer from post-exertion malaise ... it's just miserable to force yourself to get exercise and feel worse afterward!

      Delete
  2. Eating healthily and looking after our bodies is important. How we do it has to fit our lifestyle. Exercise is important ....... we should move our bodies ........ but how we do this is a personal choice.

    Looking at friends and family - some choose the gym, some choose running, some choose weights, some choose walking, some choose swimming ........some choose a mixture !

    The important thing is to exercise BUT just as important is rest and relaxation, and the well being that can also bring.

    All the best Jan

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. and here speaks a lady with a lot of experience! :-) for decades you were what we call a "gym teacher" in the US, weren't you?

      Delete
  3. Moving around is key to being in "good health" ...IMHO.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. in your work, i'm sure you see it every day. in my n=1, FEELING like moving around is just a SIGN that my health is good. :-) ...kinda like "people overeat because they're storing fat for hormonal reasons," not the other way around.

      Delete
  4. Wow nudging 60 you look great Tess. I used to be one of those tards who sat at desk all day, drove to the gym, did "cardio" like a hamster on a wheel watching music videos and drove back home. I loathed it..dreaded it - a chore. I ditched the gym and now my exercise is outdoors walking, hiking (with a club) and cycling on tracks (not dangerous roads) and I love love exercise now. I know I need to do some strength work as I age.. I've got a kettlebell and weights gathering dust..just got to pull my finger out with that one.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. thank you, Jaz! :-) ...although you remind me I need to get newer pictures -- those are about 2 years old. (i'm the least photogenic person in the WORLD)

      I believe that when our mitochondria are in good shape and we're well-nourished, we WANT to "move." one thing I picked up from Dr. Lustig's videos (in which it's said there's some bad biochemistry) is that quality of life = amount of energy we burn. when we don't feel like we can spare any -- and I've been there -- it's not LIVING. i have a huge amount of empathy for CFS/ME sufferers!

      Delete
  5. I still think the best exercise is the exercise you'll do, not the one you plan on doing and never get around to. For me, that's walking - I keep making all sorts of promises to do this, that or the other but the new routines barely last more than a few weeks. But I still walk every day out in nature - I walk past all the people on treadmills inside a gym that's on my way and SMH wondering what they get out of it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. that really rings true with me. and i find walking to be the one i can do most consistently, too. :-) the strongest incentive for me to eat right is that my body is supple and my knee DOESN'T hurt when i walk....

      Delete
  6. I think in the end it comes down simply to being active, versus being inactive. I do think being active trends with better health, and that it's a wellness tool. But your point about not even having energy to be active is an excellent one; much deeper, systemic problems to address there. Activity level/desire for same is kind of a tip of an iceberg in that case, no?

    I often feel like just taking care of a house and grounds can be a very rigorous workout. For me, yesterday and today, I pruned 11 rose bushes, cleaned out the surrounding beds, dragged all clippings, leaves, and debris out to the curb, load by load. On top of laundry, cleaning, vacuuming etc. I wear my heart rate monitor for gardening sometimes, just to see what it looks like heartrate-wise, and it generally shows very real exertion, often upwards of 80% (which is too high, really). This work seems like a modern version of a primal life to me (though I do hope they enjoyed some roses themselves, too).

    Great post.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. thank you, Wendy! :-) ...sounds like you got a pretty good workout in your garden, and have something to show for it too, as compared to those who burned an equal amount of energy on a treadmill.

      Delete
  7. A person who moves around a whole day long almost does not NEED to do something extra. ALMOST, but there is a "BUT". Exercise is a luxury we can do without as our strong and active foremothers did. However, I would rather have that luxury because I am happy to live in modern times when one is lucky to choose how many and which activities he/she could have. I observed many hardworking and strong females in my own country. They grow tighter with age, among them is normal to have things like a back pain,a reduced range of motion, weak abdominal muscles, tight Achilles tendon and Iliotibial Band, to name a few conditions. My mom is a good example, she was in my house for a month, left couple weeks ago. It was alarming for me to see her developing several body pains for a while, so I took her to a very good physical therapist. As I suspected, all her pains were due to different tightness, which she initially had trouble to believe, but she went home in a way much better shape with a long list of exercises to continue. She told me it was much easier for her to follow the program at my house - she had more energy for exercises because she had no duties to perform. We walked a lot , of course, in our Florida nature preserves and on an ocean shore.
    It seems counterintunitive to develop tightness despite doing cleaning and gardening, but from observing my mom , I have noticed that she kept compensating for it with doing things differently than before.
    I am writing it not in order to be critical, but as a precaution for all of us. My mom was born at 1937 after all, and only recently she reached the point when it was necessary to do something about it. After her arrival home, she joined a yoga group for older people.

    ReplyDelete