My favorite way to exercise is
I've done a great many types of exercise. Since being diagnosed with multiple sclerosis about fifteen years ago, I've had to periodically revise my exercise program. My MS is stable, but I am in my sixties. I still enjoy yoga and Pilates, but my current favorite is aqua aerobics.
My typical weekly routine is
I am participating in the Presidential Challenge Active Lifestyle program, which requires that you exercise five times a week. I try to get in two hour-long aqua aerobics classes, one hour of yoga, and one hour of Pilates. For the fifth day, or if I have to miss a class, I walk or do light weights.
How I got started
I knew that my gym offered aqua aerobics, but I thought of it as a class for old people. Then one of the high school students who worked at the gym told me that she had taken the classes and they were actually quite demanding. I decided to try a class and was immediately hooked. I've been doing aqua exercise for about four years without getting bored. There are people in their eighties in my class, but we have participants of all ages, including teenagers.
Why I love it
Physical fitness experts cite several advantages to water exercise. There's little stress on joints. You're working against the resistance of the water. It's difficult to take a fall because the water holds you up. The water keeps you from overheating. These last two are really important for MS patients, as sometimes our balance is affected, and heat can bring on an exacerbation.
Those are the reasons the experts give. I've got another reason. It's fun. I'm basically playing in the water. I guess I never got to do that enough as a kid, and it makes me feel like a kid to this day. Moving through the water just feels good. It's the closest thing to a full-body massage without paying a masseuse. I even enjoy stretching in the water, and I hate stretching when dry.
Our basic routine is a brief warm-up of walking or jogging across the pool, followed by some stretching. Next comes an aerobic workout of at least half an hour. We leap, kick, and do jumping jacks in the water. If you give it your all, you will get an excellent aerobic workout. We spend the balance of the class on strength exercises. Sometimes we do crunches and other ab exercises while balanced on noodles. Sometimes we work with foam weights that in the water work much like standard weights. The final five minutes is devoted to stretching again.
Advice
- Don't discount water exercise until you have tried it.
- The more you put into aqua aerobics, the more you will get out of it. If the basic workout isn't demanding enough, kick harder, jog faster and jump higher.
- When you are traveling, you can keep up with your routine anywhere that has a pool. You may not be able to do everything that you do in your water class, but at the least you can spend half an hour walking in the pool.
- Even if you are a non-swimmer, you can participate in aqua aerobics.
- If you are a swimmer, it's easy to beef up your program by swimming a few laps before or after.
