Exercise for Highly Sensitive People
Ariadne by John Waterhouse.
Wouldn't it be great if we could lose weight and be in shape simply by thinking about it? If that were the case, most of us would find ourselves fit in no time! But, that's where it starts, in the mind. The key to being fit is to get moving.
The purpose of Exercise for HSP is to give you tips on how you, as a Highly Sensitive Woman (person), can design your own moving program, work out and stay comfortable, during and after exercise, while regaining energy and muscle tone without terrible relapses of pain! So get ready to be the captain of your own ship!
The HSP & Exercise Dilemma
Without exercise you cannot repair cartilage, restore lubrication to your joints, or reduce inflammation or pain. You will lose muscle and gain weight, as it is muscle that burns calories. Without exercise, our bodies are less efficient, creating energy imbalance.
Highly Sensitive People need exercise just like everyone else does. The trouble is, when you already have Fibromyalgia, Arthritis, Chronic Pain, Chronic Fatigue, Tension Myositis or Myofascial Pain, or other stress syndromes that affect your muscular and skeletal system, it is hard to know what to do, for how long, and when to do it. It is often easier to do nothing, but that just makes things worse.
Is your belly getting fatter and the rest of you flabbier even though you've maintained your weight within 10 pounds of your normal weight? Normal weight obesity is a huge health concern for all Americans, especially Highly Sensitive Women who become fearful of the after-effects of exercise and so don't get as much exercise as they should.
The Frustration!
Highly Sensitive People have a tendency to question themselves (sometimes over and over again) as to why they can't exercise without ending up in extreme pain or fatigued, sometimes for days after exercising. What's even harder for some to understand is that what worked one week may not work the next! This is because Highly Sensitive People are constantly reacting to internal and external stressors that affect their energy on many levels.
As We Age
As we age, if we are not physically active our muscles can deteriorate and begin to atrophy in as little as two weeks. Poor diet or digestion, dehydration, vitamin or mineral deficiencies, stress, and genetics can speed up this process. If we lose cartilage and the protective sheathing over our nerves from lack of exercise, our nerve impulses won't get to the brain as quickly, or as correctly, in order to make muscles respond.
If you are a senior, your insulin levels no longer prevent your muscles from breaking down between meals and while sleeping. Poor digestion and/or circulation may also prevent your muscles from getting the nutrients and hormones they need. In addition, aging adults are less able to utilize protein sources to build muscle.
Older adults must avoid inflammation and tummy fat. If you avoid these two, your heart can remain healthy. C-Reactive Protein (CRP) is linked to inflammation. Exercise reduces this protein. Another way to reduce inflammation is to avoid foods that cause inflammation.
While strength training does much to improve muscle tone, doing too much too soon can create scar tissue in the muscles. It is important to begin exercising slowly and build up.
About Those 'Noodle-like' Muscles!
As already stated, without muscle, we lose energy and strength. Without muscle, our joints are not held in place. Without muscle, we gain weight (muscle burns calories). Without muscle, our hearts shrink. Without muscle, we lose our youth and our health. We lose our energy and vitality. There are stretches and exercises you can do to increase the flexibility and tone of your muscles, even if you have chronic conditions!
Exercise Pain Facts for HSPs
If you have Fibromyalgia or Arthritis, exercise will help you to lose weight, feel more energetic and less depressed, but it will not take away your pain. It may even add to your pain if you are not choosing the correct exercises.
If you have Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, with or without Fibromyalgia, you may have a 'delayed pain' response after exercise. CFS sufferers commonly do not feel the effects of exercise until 3-4 days later when they experience headache, back pain, or other aches. They may not even associate the pain to the exercise performed days before, since they felt fine at the time. Now they have fatigue and pain and don't understand why. This can become an ongoing cycle of frustration.
To distinguish between the two, CFS is mostly a 'fatigue' type syndrome, where Fibromyalgia is mostly a 'pain' syndrome. They often overlap, with the deciding factor being whether you relate more to the pain or the fatigue interfering in your daily activities.
If you have Chronic Pain, with a doctor's determination of no physical cause, you may be dealing with Tension Myositis Syndrome (emotional pain manifested physically) or Myofascial Pain Syndrome (tension knots in muscles). Exercise may make things worse if you are not also incorporating Trigger Point Therapy to your exercise plan. Trigger Point Therapy helps to get rid of those knots in your muscles that refer pain to other parts of your body. Without working on Trigger Points, you may actually make them worse by exercising too much, too soon, or by not warming up enough before working out. Even if you do warm up, without dealing with emotional pain, you will not be able to keep the Trigger Points from coming back.
Nutritional Deficiencies Can Cause Pain and Prevent Repair
If your diet lacks of whole foods, lean protein, vitamins and minerals, or you have digestive problems, which make it impossible for your body to absorb nutrients, your body will not be able to repair itself. You will become acidic, meaning toxins will build up in your body tissues and your cells will be depleted of life sustaining oxygen. If this is ongoing, you will develop pain because your cells are 'tired'. You won't be able to recover quickly, if at all!
For all-natural, balanced, and nutritious foods to choose from there's the TCL e-book, "Eating, Naturally!".
If you are interested in losing pounds, there's the TCL e-book, On Losing Weight.
Snack before exercising. 15 minutes before warming up and exercising, have a small snack that includes a fat or protein, such as small banana and a handful of walnuts. Within 15 minutes after exercising and cooling down, have a highly absorbable form of protein, such as a smoothie with added liquid amino acids (protein).
Aerobic Exercise
There are two forms of exercise you need. The first is aerobic (breathing and fat burning). Aerobic exercise increases blood and oxygen to every area of your body. This is just what you need to make pain go away, as pain is caused from too little oxygen and blood flow. The second is resistance (controlled movements for increasing muscle tone). It can be a major challenge for out-of-shape Highly Sensitive People to do just the warm up exercises that are supposed to precede these two!
For those with Fibromyalgia, Arthritis, Chronic Fatigue, IBS or any other Stress Syndrome, the only aerobic activities I suggest from the start are light walking or gentle swimming. If you have no knee problems, you might also use an exercise bike. Stick with exercises that offer minimal risk of falling. This will help you not to overly jar your joints.
Start Out With a Simple Walking Plan
Week 1 & 2: 5 minutes per day x 2-3 days
Week 3 & 4: 5 minutes x 3-5 days
Week 5 & 6: 5 minutes x 6-7 days
Weeks 7: 10 minutes x 5-7 days
Weeks 8: 15 minutes x 5-7 days
Weeks 9: 20 minutes x 5-7 days
Weeks 10: 25 minutes x 5-7 days
Weeks 11: 30 minutes x 7 days!
You may keep increasing your time until you are walking up to an hour each day. If you ever experience problems, rest for a couple of days and then begin again at an easier level than that which you stopped at.
To Calculate Your Target Heart Rate
Subtract your age from 220
To find the lower end of your THR multiply your answer x .6
To find the upper end of your THR multiply your answer by .8
Example:
220 - 60 (years of age) = 160
160 x .6 = 96
160 x .8 = 128
This individual does not want to drop below 96, or rise above 128, while exercising.
When exercising, stay between your two numbers!
To determine your heart beat per minute, take your pulse by counting how many heart beats you feel in your wrist (using the tips of your middle three fingers below the base of your thumb) in 15 seconds and multiply by 4. This will show you your 'number'. If it is lower than your lowest THR, pick things up a bit, if higher than your THR, slow down, your are hurting yourself.
Resistance Exercise
Once again, if you have a stress syndrome, you'll need to take baby steps. If you don't, you may set yourself back by as much as a month or so. Resistance exercises should not be considered until you are able to safely perform a stretching routine first. This means gradually developing strength and endurance over a period of a few weeks by walking, swimming, or stretching, before going on to resistance/strength training exercises.
Perform resistance exercises only twice per week. You can use exercise bands, or very light weights (2-5 lbs.), but only after you can manage basic stretches in the same body positions without discomfort.
Seek out a book on strength training from your library or bookstore. Then, choose the exercises you are interested in. Perform at least two exercises for each muscle group. Just remember to start with very light weights (2-3 pounds), regardless of what the book may suggest. Then, move on to 5 pound or 8 pound weights when you are completely ready. I don't suggest heavier weights than these. If you are comfortable with 8-10 pound weights, rather than increase the weight, increase your repetitions instead.
Calinetics (more recently called Callanetics) - 'Muscle Against Muscle' Resistance
Bedridden or Incapacitated? When using muscle against muscle, start out slowly. You want to focus on tensing and then releasing a particular muscle group for a certain amount of time. Then you'll move on to the next group and repeat.
For example, let's say you want stronger biceps. Sit straight up in a perfect posture position, bend your elbows at your sides, like you are holding a rolled up rug, palms up. Now curl your fingers closed (make a loose fist). Keep your elbows at waist level. Now slowly pull your fist towards your chest. Tighten up your upper arms and give a squeeze that lasts 10 seconds and relax. Lower your arms. You shouldn't be feeling it in your shoulder. Focus on the biceps, your upper arm muscles. Start with no more than 10 seconds of muscle tensing in each muscle group that you exercise. You can perform this kind of exercise with every muscle group (arms, legs, abdomen, etc.). Add 5 more seconds each week until you can hold the muscle group tense for 25 seconds before relaxing. If you experience any pain, stop.
How To Really Stay in Shape!
OK. There's a way to really stay in shape using 10 minute segments out of your day. Have you ever watched children at play? They walk, then run like mad, then walk again. A few minutes later they run like mad again for 20-30 seconds and then slow down again. Kids do this all day long, so do young adults. These short, intense bursts of energy that make the heart work hard for only 20-30 seconds keep the body's metabolism revved up all day long and growth hormone levels in abundance! This is called peaking.
If you are really out of shape or haven't exercised in awhile, don't do this until you have followed the other guidelines on this web page and they have become easy for you. Then, and only then, do your warm up routine, walk for 5 minutes at a brisk pace, sprint for 20-30 seconds, walk for another 5 minutes and finish up with your cool down stretches. Doing this 3 times each day is actually better for you than just walking for a straight 30 minutes at your target heart rate! Work up to performing no more than 8 of these segments in your day.
Exercise Energy Wellness Tips!
Go to your favorite bookstore and browse books on Stretching, Ballet (they show great exercises) or Pilates. Look for books where some of the exercises are shown twice in order to reveal an easier technique, or start and finish positions. When you find a book you like, with reasonable exercises for your condition, take it home with you or make copies of the exercises you might actually do. This is going to be your manual for the next few weeks!
Stick with beginner exercises at first, which will serve to increase the energy of the associated muscle groups involved. As you get stronger, your 'beginner' stretching exercises will make wonderful warm up and cool down exercises for before and after exercising.
Don't let others tell you that you are not doing enough. Don't be self-critical either. Only you know what you are and are not capable of.Don't fall into the trap of designing an elaborate exercise plan, at least not at first. Choose basic exercises, plain and simple.
Warm up the larger muscles of the body first. Legs are great to start with. They warm us up fast. Then, stretch out and work out from head to toe!
Learn Yoga, Tai Chi, or Qui Gong. Besides swimming, they are the most 'healing' of any exercises you can learn to perform. Yoga and Pilates are excellent for creating strong, toned and limber muscles, but they can be too challenging for out-of-shape HSPs. Save these for later.
Work out in the morning. By working out in the morning hours (or, if you work nights, after your normal sleep schedule), you loosen up tight muscles so you can relax better throughout the day, you raise your metabolism and will burn off more calories over the next 24 hours, you eliminating the worry that you may not have time to exercise later on in the day, and your self-esteem is increased because of your discipline and determination!
Go for Variety! Highly Sensitive People need variety. That goes for exercise too. Anything less is absolute drudgery. Variety makes exercise more like play!
If you are lucky enough to have a highly sensitive friend, exercise with them. You can cheer each other on!
