Written by Deserée Corrales, former SDSU Extension BCBH Bilingual Community Educator.
Regardless of age, everyone can engage in some form of physical activity. You can still be active even if you have a chronic health condition, like arthritis, heart disease, or chronic pain. Engaging in physical activity can be beneficial. For most older adults, physical activities, like brisk walking, riding a bike, swimming, and gardening, are safe, especially if you start slowly and continue to increase your ability. You may want to speak with your health care provider about how your health condition might affect your ability to be active.
Developing an Exercise Program
When developing an exercise program for yourself, it is good to include three types of exercise: flexibility, strengthening and endurance.
- Flexibility exercises, such as tai chi and stretching, can help keep joints moving and give you more freedom of movement for daily activities.
- Strengthening exercises, like seated leg raises, will help you maintain or increase your muscle strength to support and protect your joints.
- Endurance exercises make the heart and arteries healthier. Try activities, such as biking and swimming. Even if you can only exercise 10 minutes at a time, that is perfectly acceptable. Exercising three times a day for 10 minutes has similar benefits to exercising one time for 30 minutes.
What You Eat Matters
Along with staying active, what you put in your body is also especially important. There are ways to manage your chronic condition or even reverse its effects with your diet.
When making changes to how you eat, it is important to make slight changes that are doable in your daily routine, so that you are successful in keeping those changes over the long run, such as:
- Using fresh vegetables and fruit. Use frozen options in the offseason to make sure you include them in your cooking year-round.
- Making a weekly meal plan and shopping list.
- Being sure to include a variety of foods from all food groups.
- Cooking more at home.
- Limiting your intake of processed foods.
Better Choices, Better Health® South Dakota has many free workshop options to help support you in incorporating more physical activity and healthy eating in your life.
