I said in my “Are You Into Life As Much As God Is?” Blog “Adding Strength Training to my ‘BJ Total Body Health Program’ was the best thing I ever did for my health and my body.” In my “Have You Done The Math?” Blog I said “One morning I was doing my Fitness Walking and I tripped on what must have been a lift in the sidewall. I was on my way down, but because of my ‘Strong Core’ I was able to pull myself up out of the fall. That made me realize how Important a ‘Strong Core’ really is. It is especially important for seniors because a lot of senior’s deaths are from falls or complications from a fall.” My “Strong Core” is the Result of Strength Training.
As people get older Strength Training is “Not An Option,” but a MUST. Strength Training is how people stay Mobile. Strength Training is what keeps people from having to use Walkers and Wheelchairs. This e-mail article “Get the body you want and bones you need” from “Easy Health Options” adds:
Did know aerobic activity could make you fat?
A study in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research had 81 previously sedentary premenopausal women walk 30 minutes three times a week without changing diet. The subjects showed no real weight or fat mass losses overall…
However, 55 of the 81 women were labeled as compensators and gained fat during the 12-week study. This is not typically a desired outcome.
Let’s say through diet and maybe exercise you lose weight. If a large percent of that weight is lean muscle your metabolism will slow. The rate that you burn calories at rest, and while doing everything else you do all day, will decrease.
This sets you up for weight gain in the future. Unfortunately, it’s like a two-for-one. You don’t just gain back what you lost. You get back more.
The only way to offset your newly slowed metabolism is to exercise more and eat less. In fact it’s well known that successful weight maintenance programs include more activity than weight loss programs. Forever. Your ever-plummeting metabolism will make you tired and still require fewer and fewer calories. Typically women both diet and exercise diligently for a short time and then end it and hope it works out for them. That’s a formula for weight cycling up every time it happens.
There’s a better way not to “weigh less” but to weigh ideal and look like you weigh less. You can stop being a slave to the scale and start to focus on your health and your happiness. You shouldn’t have to check with the scale in the morning to find out if you’re happy. Stinky shoes and more laundry are a better gage.
If you must measure something, measure your inches and your ability to lift weight. The blessing of strength training for a woman with weight to lose is that you will be more successful from the beginning than any time you’ve ever started aerobic exercise.
Your after-50 fitness formula includes a nutrient-rich, satisfying diet, proper aerobic activity and a good dose of the right resistance training. Dieting alone may result in weight loss, temporarily. The weight tends to be muscle.
The down side of weight training
If you’re a scale slave there is bad news. Resistance training will blunt your weight loss.
A 150lb woman who strength trains, however, is more likely to wear a smaller pair of pants than a 150lb woman who doesn’t. Proportions will change like they do not with aerobic-only exercise.
Despite the study mentioned earlier, you could lose weight or get slimmer temporarily with aerobic-only exercise if you’re not overeating. But the results make you skinny-fat. Studies show you will lose strength and bone density if you only do endurance exercise. Lean, light and fragile is not a good combination.
Osteoporosis and osteopenia refer to low bone density that puts you at greater risk for fractures. Sarcopenia is loss of lean muscle tissue associated with aging. It’s not inevitable but it is more probable if you don’t lift and eat in favor of muscle. Dynapenia is a loss of muscle strength with aging. Sarcopenia and dynapenia set you up for risk of falling. Osteoporosis and osteopenia set you up for fractures if you do fall. You, at 50, may be overconfident about your fall risk. Yet, even your forgotten calf muscles predispose you for falls. At middle age a woman’s fall risk associated with weak soleus muscles increases. The soleus is the calf muscle underneath the larger gastrocnemius muscle. One of the only ways to work it is to do seated heal raises.
Your habits now determine what happens both now and in future decades. If your muscles go bye-bye you don’t get them back easily. It’s not impossible. The deck is just stacked against you.
Once you passed age 35, strength training became truly indispensable for maintaining muscle mass–along with adequate protein intake and the right post-workout nutrition habits. If that ship has been departing without you, it’s time to reevaluate your exercise routine and A-list weight training in your post-50 party plans.
Here’s the irony of the strength training gender bias. Men who exercise tend to spend more time lifting. Women who exercise tend to find aerobic activity more appealing. Women need strength training more than men. Overall you’re smaller, weigh less, and when you lose estrogen you lose bone at an even faster rate. Plus you’re more likely to live longer, losing little breadcrumbs of bone along the way. Weight rooms should be designed to appeal to women 35 and over and, in particular, 50 and over! Find a gym that feels comfortable or make one at home.
Your first rodeo with weight training might be a group fitness class. It’s a natural if you’re already comfortable in that environment. It’s potentially a good introduction but don’t hang your weight gloves on it. Group strength training classes with high repetitions won’t help you lose fat or gain lean muscle. High repetitions is defined as anything that you can do 15 or more times. Multiple sets of higher reps (at lower weight) do not have the same effect on fat, bones, or muscle, as sets of lower reps (of higher weight).
The article was about women, but the information also applies to men. Yoga is the “Strength Training” I use. I do a lot of thinking for my writing while Exercising, which makes Exercising very personal for me so I always Exercise alone. People must do what works for them and what makes them Exercise Consistently. “Health Tip” from “Healing With Nutrition” adds:
Studies show muscle mass tends to deteriorate at the rate of 8% per decade after age 40. New mouse and human studies reveal that this loss is due to inactivity, rather than to age alone, since there is no muscle mass lost in athletes (mouse or human) who continue to work out into their 80’s (or equivalent in mouse years!) To avoid old age weakness, evaluate your exercise regime for strength training, flexibility, balance, and cardiovascular benefits and devise a plan you can use into your 80’s. It’s never too late to strengthen your body!
I finally found a realistic article where a woman stated it took her around three years to see the true results of Strength Training. From that I stopped weighing once a month. I did weigh two months so I could put my weight in “The Trilogy” (Purchase Buttons at this Website).
This e-mail article “Falls Are Among the Leading Cause of Injury and Death for Seniors” from “Dr. Mercola” also adds:
Each year, 2.8 million older adults are treated in U.S. emergency rooms due to falls; more than 800,000 of them are hospitalized as a result
Falls are also the most common cause of traumatic brain injuries and account for $31 billion in direct U.S. medical costs annually
Balance and coordination exercises and strength training, along with optimizing your vitamin D levels, can reduce your risk of falls and fall-related injuries
As people get older Eating Right is “Not An Option,” but a MUST and this e-mail article “What You Eat Can Add Years to Your Life” from “Very Well” adds:
We all have the ability to live healthier, stronger, and longer lives simply by eating the most nutritious foods for our bodies. The importance of good nutrition cannot be overstated. I have personally seen how an optimal diet can prevent and reverse disease. I have written books about the therapeutic power the right foods can have on such problems as heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, allergies, asthma, autoimmune illnesses (including lupus) and headaches.
I firmly believe that few people can expect to have good health without paying attention to the consumption of high-micronutrient foods. The latest scientific advances in nutritional research continue to provide evidence in support of these facts.
The latest to shine a spotlight on the necessity of a superior diet is a new group of data released by The Global Burden of Disease study. It is a huge, ongoing project collecting data in 188 countries. An international research team evaluates studies on each of 79 modifiable risk factors associated with preventable deaths and loss of quality of life years, grading the evidence that links each one to early death and adding more risk factors to the list when new evidence arises.
The study cited poor eating habits as the most significant risk factor for premature death worldwide. It found diet was the primary factor responsible for the greatest number of premature deaths starting in 2000 and up to the most recent data for 2013, accounting for 11.3 million deaths worldwide in 2013.
In recent decades, the American diet has undergone a transformation that has put disease-causing refined carbohydrates, oils, and animal products at the center of every meal, with natural plant foods playing only a minor role. This dietary shift became apparent when researchers looked at the data. As new parts of the world continue to adopt these eating habits, diet is becoming a larger burden on health and lifespan all over the world.
What Foods Place You at High-Risk?
When researchers looked at some of the dietary risk factors individually, they found that between 2000 and 2013 there was a global increase in the numbers of deaths associated with the following factors:
Low Fruit Consumption
High Sodium Intake
Low Fiber Diet
Low Consumption of Nuts and Seeds
Diet High in Processed and Red Meats
Based on the above dietary factors, it should be no surprise that there was an increase in the number of deaths over this same time period associated with high blood pressure, high BMI or body mass index, and high fasting blood glucose rates.
The Good News
The study didn’t yield all bad news though. Mortality due to the consumption of trans fat and secondhand smoke declined during that time and, as the authors pointed out, each of the risk factors have the potential to be eliminated or reduced in our diets. Already we are seeing a stronger emphasis on whole foods, clean eating, and a wider interest in more thoughtful food selection. Our individual choices have a huge potential to positively improve our health. The trends the study spotlighted are reversible, and the deaths associated with a poor diet are avoidable. It took many years, but today everyone knows that smoking causes lung cancer and as a result, tobacco use is declining and so are the negative health effects associated with its use.
The data suggests that this is beginning to occur with trans fat, too. We are certainly not there, yet, but we are moving toward a time when processed meats, commercial baked goods, and sugar-sweetened beverages will be viewed by everyone as dangerous.
I encourage everyone to eat a nutrient-dense, plant-rich diet of greens, colorful vegetables, beans, nuts, seeds, and some fruit. Make salad the main meal. Eat big salads and lots of tomato, onion, raw and cooked greens, and mushrooms. Until everyone learns to avoid processed food, excessive animal products and oils preventable diseases will continue to plague us.
A diet that delivers a broad array of micronutrients via a wide spectrum of healthy foods is the most satisfying and the most healthful.
In “The Trilogy” I said, “I do NOT eat everything I love, but my Six Every Day except for my Fast Day is Coffee, Eggs, Yogurt or Kefir, Peanut Butter on Bread or Nuts, Wine and Dessert. People enjoying their Exercise and Diet is how people stick with it. “My Six Every Day” makes NOT eating everything I love like french fries and pizza not matter. Three Kisses with Almonds and Yogurt is one of my Desserts.
The best way to “avoid processed food” is cooking at home. With people’s busy schedules it is hard, but dealing with an illness is even harder. I cook almost every day. Except for my Fast Day I have a salad for dinner almost every day. I only eat meat once a day at dinner. I get my variety in having different types of meats.
WITHOUT STRENGTH TRAINING YOU ARE HEADED TO A WALKER OR WHEELCHAIR!
As people get older Strength Training is “Not An Option,” but a MUST. Strength Training is how people stay Mobile. Strength Training is what keeps people from having to use Walkers and Wheelchairs. This e-mail article “Get the body you want and bones you need” from “Easy Health Options” adds:
Did know aerobic activity could make you fat?
A study in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research had 81 previously sedentary premenopausal women walk 30 minutes three times a week without changing diet. The subjects showed no real weight or fat mass losses overall…
However, 55 of the 81 women were labeled as compensators and gained fat during the 12-week study. This is not typically a desired outcome.
Let’s say through diet and maybe exercise you lose weight. If a large percent of that weight is lean muscle your metabolism will slow. The rate that you burn calories at rest, and while doing everything else you do all day, will decrease.
This sets you up for weight gain in the future. Unfortunately, it’s like a two-for-one. You don’t just gain back what you lost. You get back more.
The only way to offset your newly slowed metabolism is to exercise more and eat less. In fact it’s well known that successful weight maintenance programs include more activity than weight loss programs. Forever. Your ever-plummeting metabolism will make you tired and still require fewer and fewer calories. Typically women both diet and exercise diligently for a short time and then end it and hope it works out for them. That’s a formula for weight cycling up every time it happens.
There’s a better way not to “weigh less” but to weigh ideal and look like you weigh less. You can stop being a slave to the scale and start to focus on your health and your happiness. You shouldn’t have to check with the scale in the morning to find out if you’re happy. Stinky shoes and more laundry are a better gage.
If you must measure something, measure your inches and your ability to lift weight. The blessing of strength training for a woman with weight to lose is that you will be more successful from the beginning than any time you’ve ever started aerobic exercise.
Your after-50 fitness formula includes a nutrient-rich, satisfying diet, proper aerobic activity and a good dose of the right resistance training. Dieting alone may result in weight loss, temporarily. The weight tends to be muscle.
The down side of weight training
If you’re a scale slave there is bad news. Resistance training will blunt your weight loss.
A 150lb woman who strength trains, however, is more likely to wear a smaller pair of pants than a 150lb woman who doesn’t. Proportions will change like they do not with aerobic-only exercise.
Despite the study mentioned earlier, you could lose weight or get slimmer temporarily with aerobic-only exercise if you’re not overeating. But the results make you skinny-fat. Studies show you will lose strength and bone density if you only do endurance exercise. Lean, light and fragile is not a good combination.
Osteoporosis and osteopenia refer to low bone density that puts you at greater risk for fractures. Sarcopenia is loss of lean muscle tissue associated with aging. It’s not inevitable but it is more probable if you don’t lift and eat in favor of muscle. Dynapenia is a loss of muscle strength with aging. Sarcopenia and dynapenia set you up for risk of falling. Osteoporosis and osteopenia set you up for fractures if you do fall. You, at 50, may be overconfident about your fall risk. Yet, even your forgotten calf muscles predispose you for falls. At middle age a woman’s fall risk associated with weak soleus muscles increases. The soleus is the calf muscle underneath the larger gastrocnemius muscle. One of the only ways to work it is to do seated heal raises.
Your habits now determine what happens both now and in future decades. If your muscles go bye-bye you don’t get them back easily. It’s not impossible. The deck is just stacked against you.
Once you passed age 35, strength training became truly indispensable for maintaining muscle mass–along with adequate protein intake and the right post-workout nutrition habits. If that ship has been departing without you, it’s time to reevaluate your exercise routine and A-list weight training in your post-50 party plans.
Here’s the irony of the strength training gender bias. Men who exercise tend to spend more time lifting. Women who exercise tend to find aerobic activity more appealing. Women need strength training more than men. Overall you’re smaller, weigh less, and when you lose estrogen you lose bone at an even faster rate. Plus you’re more likely to live longer, losing little breadcrumbs of bone along the way. Weight rooms should be designed to appeal to women 35 and over and, in particular, 50 and over! Find a gym that feels comfortable or make one at home.
Your first rodeo with weight training might be a group fitness class. It’s a natural if you’re already comfortable in that environment. It’s potentially a good introduction but don’t hang your weight gloves on it. Group strength training classes with high repetitions won’t help you lose fat or gain lean muscle. High repetitions is defined as anything that you can do 15 or more times. Multiple sets of higher reps (at lower weight) do not have the same effect on fat, bones, or muscle, as sets of lower reps (of higher weight).
The article was about women, but the information also applies to men. Yoga is the “Strength Training” I use. I do a lot of thinking for my writing while Exercising, which makes Exercising very personal for me so I always Exercise alone. People must do what works for them and what makes them Exercise Consistently. “Health Tip” from “Healing With Nutrition” adds:
Studies show muscle mass tends to deteriorate at the rate of 8% per decade after age 40. New mouse and human studies reveal that this loss is due to inactivity, rather than to age alone, since there is no muscle mass lost in athletes (mouse or human) who continue to work out into their 80’s (or equivalent in mouse years!) To avoid old age weakness, evaluate your exercise regime for strength training, flexibility, balance, and cardiovascular benefits and devise a plan you can use into your 80’s. It’s never too late to strengthen your body!
I finally found a realistic article where a woman stated it took her around three years to see the true results of Strength Training. From that I stopped weighing once a month. I did weigh two months so I could put my weight in “The Trilogy” (Purchase Buttons at this Website).
This e-mail article “Falls Are Among the Leading Cause of Injury and Death for Seniors” from “Dr. Mercola” also adds:
Each year, 2.8 million older adults are treated in U.S. emergency rooms due to falls; more than 800,000 of them are hospitalized as a result
Falls are also the most common cause of traumatic brain injuries and account for $31 billion in direct U.S. medical costs annually
Balance and coordination exercises and strength training, along with optimizing your vitamin D levels, can reduce your risk of falls and fall-related injuries
As people get older Eating Right is “Not An Option,” but a MUST and this e-mail article “What You Eat Can Add Years to Your Life” from “Very Well” adds:
We all have the ability to live healthier, stronger, and longer lives simply by eating the most nutritious foods for our bodies. The importance of good nutrition cannot be overstated. I have personally seen how an optimal diet can prevent and reverse disease. I have written books about the therapeutic power the right foods can have on such problems as heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, allergies, asthma, autoimmune illnesses (including lupus) and headaches.
I firmly believe that few people can expect to have good health without paying attention to the consumption of high-micronutrient foods. The latest scientific advances in nutritional research continue to provide evidence in support of these facts.
The latest to shine a spotlight on the necessity of a superior diet is a new group of data released by The Global Burden of Disease study. It is a huge, ongoing project collecting data in 188 countries. An international research team evaluates studies on each of 79 modifiable risk factors associated with preventable deaths and loss of quality of life years, grading the evidence that links each one to early death and adding more risk factors to the list when new evidence arises.
The study cited poor eating habits as the most significant risk factor for premature death worldwide. It found diet was the primary factor responsible for the greatest number of premature deaths starting in 2000 and up to the most recent data for 2013, accounting for 11.3 million deaths worldwide in 2013.
In recent decades, the American diet has undergone a transformation that has put disease-causing refined carbohydrates, oils, and animal products at the center of every meal, with natural plant foods playing only a minor role. This dietary shift became apparent when researchers looked at the data. As new parts of the world continue to adopt these eating habits, diet is becoming a larger burden on health and lifespan all over the world.
What Foods Place You at High-Risk?
When researchers looked at some of the dietary risk factors individually, they found that between 2000 and 2013 there was a global increase in the numbers of deaths associated with the following factors:
Low Fruit Consumption
High Sodium Intake
Low Fiber Diet
Low Consumption of Nuts and Seeds
Diet High in Processed and Red Meats
Based on the above dietary factors, it should be no surprise that there was an increase in the number of deaths over this same time period associated with high blood pressure, high BMI or body mass index, and high fasting blood glucose rates.
The Good News
The study didn’t yield all bad news though. Mortality due to the consumption of trans fat and secondhand smoke declined during that time and, as the authors pointed out, each of the risk factors have the potential to be eliminated or reduced in our diets. Already we are seeing a stronger emphasis on whole foods, clean eating, and a wider interest in more thoughtful food selection. Our individual choices have a huge potential to positively improve our health. The trends the study spotlighted are reversible, and the deaths associated with a poor diet are avoidable. It took many years, but today everyone knows that smoking causes lung cancer and as a result, tobacco use is declining and so are the negative health effects associated with its use.
The data suggests that this is beginning to occur with trans fat, too. We are certainly not there, yet, but we are moving toward a time when processed meats, commercial baked goods, and sugar-sweetened beverages will be viewed by everyone as dangerous.
I encourage everyone to eat a nutrient-dense, plant-rich diet of greens, colorful vegetables, beans, nuts, seeds, and some fruit. Make salad the main meal. Eat big salads and lots of tomato, onion, raw and cooked greens, and mushrooms. Until everyone learns to avoid processed food, excessive animal products and oils preventable diseases will continue to plague us.
A diet that delivers a broad array of micronutrients via a wide spectrum of healthy foods is the most satisfying and the most healthful.
In “The Trilogy” I said, “I do NOT eat everything I love, but my Six Every Day except for my Fast Day is Coffee, Eggs, Yogurt or Kefir, Peanut Butter on Bread or Nuts, Wine and Dessert. People enjoying their Exercise and Diet is how people stick with it. “My Six Every Day” makes NOT eating everything I love like french fries and pizza not matter. Three Kisses with Almonds and Yogurt is one of my Desserts.
The best way to “avoid processed food” is cooking at home. With people’s busy schedules it is hard, but dealing with an illness is even harder. I cook almost every day. Except for my Fast Day I have a salad for dinner almost every day. I only eat meat once a day at dinner. I get my variety in having different types of meats.
WITHOUT STRENGTH TRAINING YOU ARE HEADED TO A WALKER OR WHEELCHAIR!
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