How much Exercise?

Apart from regular gardening and household chores, how many of us actually exercise? I take the dog for a daily walk, takes about 40 minutes, he runs like a mad thing on the beach while we stroll along. When we walk him on the lead, which is for about 10 of those minutes, we do walk fairly briskly, but there's always the neighbours to stop and say hello to. I sometimes wonder how much exercise we are really getting or if this counts as beneficial. Can we count walking round the shops as exercise I wonder? I suspect not, because surely that is part of normal living. I've been watching the "Biggest Loser" and to see those poor sods sweating like pigs and punishing their bodies to 'get fit' appalls me. Is this what it takes? If so, I'll have to remain unfit because I couldn't do that. I also wonder if we should look at our activity levels when we were younger and try to simulate some of that. So do we need to do some sort of focused exercise as part of our day.

Blossom...I have been walking almost daily now for 7 months & according to the scales have gone absolutely nowhere....ie exactly the same weight.....however.... I do feel that in that time I feel much fitter & firmer (if that makes sense)...when I don't walk I try to use my rowing machine & yes there is always the gardening & yes I do work up a real sweat when I get out into the garden... I guess its all about burning off the calories ..so maybe at this point in time I am just coming out even when I weigh it all up..

I know I don't exercise, but probably should. I am overweight and sit on my butt at work all day during the week and by the time I have done dinner and the animals, and perhaps some gardening if I'm lucky, I am too tired to even think about exercise. I know the principle about feeling better if I do etc., but I reckon there is a middle stage between where I am now and feeling more energetic that I am not yet ready to face.

I know the feeling Guzzi, some days just cant be bothered

Elf is going to gym twice a week through a respiratory program. He started the lectures and gym at the begining of March and its completed at the end of April.

One thing I have learnt..... he is being shown how to become fit, not through stripping off weight....but by strengthening his muscles and this will in turn support his lungs...... by not needing as much effort to work these muscles and so he isn't puffing as much.

I hope this make sense to you.

We have noticed a change and after watching all the 80 plus "Gym Junkies" twice a week, I am motivated to want to do something with weights and strengthening exercises.

So with James' bedroom doing nothing...... its going to have a tread mill (for when we can't get out) and an all in 1 home gym .........We already have the weights James didn't take.... and Bimbo's exercise bike she lets us use.

That sound great Lucky. I've been considering a treadmill so interested to see how you go. I'm never sure if I am getting enough protein for muscle improvement. Bob has osteoporosis and so muscle strength is important. Mind you - he has just dug out a trench full of stones around our patio and I couldn't move a shovelfull! So I guess he's doing OK it's only 18 months since his mastectomy. He's got over it faster than I did.
So, I read that 100 calories is worked off in 28 minutes of walking - that sux! Today I had 93 calories for breakfast, so I reckon digging up the chillies for potting on takes care of that. Going to eat lunch now

Stecranat wrote:Blossom...I have been walking almost daily now for 7 months & according to the scales have gone absolutely nowhere....ie exactly the same weight.....however.... I do feel that in that time I feel much fitter & firmer (if that makes sense)...

Hi Stec, you will probably find that your body has built up muscle...that is why your weight hasn't altered....you are on the right track, as you are now fitter.

ok i most probly dont do much but here goes in the moring i walk to the school bus and then walk around school all day. at lunch time kick the footy or a soccer ball around. then walk home from the bus stop then get changed most probly run around with the soccer ball a bit more then ill go feed my chooks and then if i have time work in my garden.

Once you get to my age you have to exercise - walking suits me - do 4k a day - take the dogs and camera - go early and I love it. I don't plod along though. I do it the way John HOward used to but stop for the dogs or a photo opportunity. Have done this for many many years after putting on weight and trying to lose it by cutting back on calories - didn't work. Took ages for the walking to have an effect though. YOu convert fat to muscle first and this weighs much the same so you have to keep at it to see results. Much easier to burn muscle than fat.

Heaps of friends spent thousands on diets and soon as they went off them put the weight back on. Unless you plan to eat that food for the rest of your life you're wasting time and money - or so it seems to me.

A few people lost weight on Dancing with the Stars and I thought that would be one way but of course they are doing intensive training on a daily basis.

The Big Loser scares me - watched a couple of episodes and hoped they had a doctor and ambulance to hand. That's losing weight the hard way.

Fran I hate the BL's on channel 10...... gives the wrong message from the start of the first add announcing a new series.....

I to be honest.....I so soooooo over all the healthy food adds & diet adds for the latest weight loss....... At this moment I am so craving for a hamburger from maccers

the best way is ust to cut back a little, moderate exercise and the weight will gradually fall off, the prob. is most people except to go say from a size 18 to a 10 overnight.

I'm a little short for my weight but try as I might I seem to be shrinking rather than getting taller. I may have to change focus and try to lose some weight . The only exercise I do is lawn mowing in the warmer months, though I'm busy converting lawn to garden so there's less of that all the time, and gardening, though I don't do much of that because once a bed is created then it's heavily mulched so I don't actually have to do a lot apart from fork it open with each new crop, and harvesting isn't really exercise. I eat well most of the time though I do tend to eat more than I need to and I do eat rubbish from time to time. I'm thinking of getting my pushbike into working order and riding rather driving some of the time. That would have the added benefit of alleviating some of the guilt associated with using fossil fuels unnecessarily !

Having been recently diagnosed with fatty liver, and with high triglycerides, liver enzymes, cholesterol, It is imperative that I both lose weight, and decrease blood pressure. While I'm not losing weight, I have been on a strict (self imposed) diet that is very low in saturated fats, sugar & salt. Makes it almost impossible to find anything to eat, so that helps stop me nibbling - LOL
We have been walking at weekends, and while I am determined to reduce my BP I have insisted the doctor let me go off one of my medications, and I now find I feel so much fitter, even though my BP is up a bit (not out of control though). Which is better? Extra medication for a "normal" BP or feeling fit enough to be able to exercise and enjoy life?
I'm not realy keen on exercising, but gardening and walking in the bush are favourites, so should help. Really should be taking the dogs out regularly too :-)
Cheers, Siri

Raymondo noticed you talked about riding your bike instead of driving...I was staring to get bored with my daily walk (ie walking track beside a noisy highway) so we now vary it & have started walking to the supermarket & main shopping area...uphill walking home & generally a bag in each hand..noticed the other day though that I seem to not even notice the extra weight I'm carrying home...so maybe just maybe I am starting to feel fitter...will perservere ..

Yes I have all the stuff here and really should get back on the walking machine, but comes down to laziness , and ATM trying to get the BP down so that my meds dont have to be changed

Siri, after I had about a year on Tamoxifen I had triglycerides off the scale with cholesterol to match. I don;t blame it all on medication, a lot of it was overeating wrong things by my emotional self, but when the Dr. wanted me to go on even more medication I baulked. I asked for 3 months to get it right myself. I got the Juice book by the same author as the Liver Cleansing diet Sandra Cabot. I juiced apples celery and artichoke . You don;t get much from the artichoke but it is so potent a liver cleanser that a teaspoon is enough. After 3 months I was down to normal, and while it creeps up every now and then, when it does, I just juice again for a while and it goes down. Low fat diet helps of course!

Years ago I tried exercise classes going to the gym etc..hate all that stuff to me boring...hated it when the pysthio(sic) used to put me on an exercise bike for ten minutes or so...peddling away looking at blank wall...walking I don't mind...though I would rather make the effort to walk places (instead of the car) then just go on walk for exercise...I would really prefer to scrub clean all that sort of thing rather than a gym....

The best exercise in the world is "pushing yourself away from the table with both hands" at least three times a day.

I walk 5 km every morning starting at 0715 and get back about 0800 to 0815. I do this rain, snow or heat without fail. I do minor work in the garden which probably contributes to some exercise.

I eat breakfast before the walk, of cooked flat rolled oats and a bowl of mashed soy beans.

http://www.durgan.org/ShortURL/?ZRVRZ Summary: Soy Bean preparation This has been my breakfast for 30 years or more.

I drink a glass of home made"juice" sometime in the morning, and often have a glass as as thirst quencher sometimes during the day.
http://www.durgan.org/ShortURL/?QPQOE Summary: Juice Making.

I eat a second meal some time in the afternoon between 1300 AND 1700, of whatever is going at the time. I like food of all types, and don't usually eat for taste, but always have in the back of my mind, "is this good for me?

If going out for a big meal I cut down on food intake the day before and the day after, and do justice to the meal-eating everything in sight.

I maintain my weight of 13 stone 8 lbs, and have the energy of two people.

Eat to live -not live to eat. All it takes is a change in tradition and habit, and a small change in mindset. Certainly in NA the traditional diet of meat and meat and meat is killing people. The old pioneer type of meal, which was essential due to the terrific expenditure of calories just doing the physical work required to make a living has continued. Unfortunately, when life became easy and modern, we kept the eating habits without the work, and it shows in our health statistics today.

I use to work on threshing crews as a youngster and we ate three heavy meals plus additional sandwiches a day, and sometimes at meal times I was full and still hungry, since the expenditure of energy was higher than our intake. Twelve to fourteen hours on the working end of a pitch fork is far different from a hour building rubber muscles for an hour in a gym. Now I could understand a gym if one spend eight hours working out doing "jerk and stop" exercises, similar to chopping wood, pitching sheaves, or throwing manure, or digging holes, or jigging for fish on a fishing boat, or digging coal in a mine with a shovel. Those types of exercise build strong muscles not the rubber type a gym produces.
My view.