Staying fit in advanced age

For starters, I am 75 years old and no Jack LaLanne when it comes to exercise; however, I believe that his approach to exercise--"motion is lotion, rest is rust--hits the nail on the head with surgical precision. My first rule is "don't get injured". I approach all the physical activities I engage in with that in mind. Much of exercise at my age is minimizing losses--muscle loss, bone loss, strength loss, and the rest. Yet with resistance training, balance exercises, flexibility exercises, and cardiovascular training, I am able to do quite well at holding off the kinds of things that plague seniors. Just as important as exercise is good quality sleep, stress management and nutrition. I like variety, and so change things around regularly. My latest old-dog-new-tricks exercise is learning to juggle, which is fun and helps eye-hand-coordination, reflexes, balance and cognition.

'Making the better choice" is how I approach eating. Life is too short to not enjoy food. I stick to a general plan (I favor a Mediterranean diet) and try not to obsess with getting it right--80% is good enough. It is important for seniors to get enough protein; experts suggest about 1.2 gram of protein per kilogram of body weight (1 kg = 2.2 lbs).

My husband and I were part of the YMCA. Here’s my story.

A couple of months prior to Hurricane IAN hitting Florida, my mommy’s cancer worsened and I alone with my Beautiful Husband worked together with my siblings as caregivers but being the oldest and not working most of it fell on us. She passed away in August.

October that year we ended up in Florida as first responders which helped me with grief management. To make a long story short we assisted in Florida until mid December, rested at home for 2 weeks later and then headed to Illinois spending the holidays with our kids and returned home mid January.

Being so preoccupied I thought those things helped me with the grief process but I still had my moments. Lord, we wished someone would have told us when you get older your body gets stiff and aches and it takes you a little longer to get back to normal after being on the road for a while. We were like whipped noodles.

By the way this long story appears to be not so short as stated earlier. I apologize for lying. 🤥😁 Let’s get this over with.

A few months after returning home my husband’s mommy who was in the nursing home at the time fell and broke her hip. Had to have hip replacement surgery, blamed us for everything wrong in her life so on and so forth.
That was a very painful experience because she was a narcissist and if anyone ever had the opportunity to experience life with a narcissistic person it is a soul crushing and scarring experience. (We are still detoxing 🙏 needed).

Out of respect for my husband I will not go into the painful details we encounter trying to advocate for her but up until her death this August we didn’t go to the YMCA nor did we go when my mom cancer became worse.

Ending in sight.😁 Really.

August 2023 was a spiritually difficult time for us:

My mother died a year ago in August, my mother n law died this year in August and both died a few days short of our anniversary date in August. 😭 Just reflecting on it makes me shed tears. Give me a moment need to get a big hug from Beautiful Husband hug 🤗

🕰️Twenty Minutes Later clock🕰️

Grief had its grip on us some kinda bad and we were just trying to get through each day and detox from the pain of losing our mommies, the untold family toxicity on my husband’s side, my health issues, siblings issues on both sides, lord, lord, lord,!

Now I am getting to the YMCA part. Finally you say.🙄 I know. I know. Those dam Life happenstances.

🚙🚙🚙🚙🚙🚙🚙🚙🚙
We were driving to Home Depot’s one-day to cancel an appointment for a renovation project they seem to didn’t have contractors for. 🙄 Service has seriously gone down.

We were reflecting on our lives and health. I had experienced several falls due to ongoing back and nerve pain so exercising is a no, no at this time in my life.

My beautiful husband is a worry wart and he doesn’t want to be far from me so he works around the house for fear of me falling.

Beautiful Husband during the drive home said we need to celebrate our anniversary. We have to get back to enjoying life together. We need a road trip. I yelled, “Yeah, road trip!”

At that moment the Y popped into my head. I said, “Honey you know it’s been a year since we been to the Y since momma got sick and not once did they call us to see if we were dead or alive.”

Y’all stick with me. I’m almost done. 😁

He replied, “Yeah, every health club I been a member to in the past when I missed a month or so I received a call to see what was going on.” It’s been a year and no one’s call?!

Clarity was returning, a good sign for those of us floating around in grief’s shadow grip. He suggested that I give them a call to request a membership hold.

So, I called the Y. I had a piece of paper to write down what I needed to do. I spoke to a young lady and asked them to put our membership on hold. The young lady said the only way to do that would be with a doctors notes and supporting medical records detailing that there is a medical reason and it should state how long it is expected to last. They would review it and make a determination whether to put it on hold. She provided the email to request the hold and to upload the documents.

I emailed them directly giving the name of the person who I spoke with. I expressed my displeasure with the option given to put memberships on hold. I also expressed that I was concerned that for a whole year not once did they reach out to the members to determine reasons why we weren’t coming in. Being that they have numerous elderly members like ourselves it’s not uncommon that illnesses, nursing homes entries, caregivers, or deaths occur. I expressed concern that based upon our experience it clearly obvious they don’t care about the members they only care their money. I asked what if the member passed away would you have refunded the family the money back?

I went on to write that It is because of the elderly populace the Y is able to keep its doors open when many of their facilities have closed due to low enrollment. We did not ask to refund any money we just asked for a membership hold. We don’t work for you and don’t owe you no doctor’s note to hold a membership.

It cost nothing to walk, watch YouTube exercise videos or use Local Community Center Resources. Therefore, cancellation is in order. Thank you and good bye.

Here is their reply:

“ We offer the option to put your membership on a medical hold for up to 3 months. By doing this, your membership would automatically renew again after the number of months you need. With it automatically renewing this way, you would not need to go through the rejoining process again. If you would like to go forward with this, please provide us with a doctor’s note or an equivalent form of verification for the month or months you wish to place your YMCA membership on hold. This doctor's note does not have to contain personal medical information for hold processing. You can email a copy of it to.”

We stuck to our decision. They would have kept taking our money and used the doctor’s notes as way to fight in the event a refund was requested.

I am not anti Y but I just want to make sure we as elderly are aware of this to make better informed choices for our health and financially supporting our health wellbeing.

😅 Whew!! Thanks for hanging with me if you read this long winded post. If I made grammatical errors please forgive me, my fingers laid down and said no more when trying to make corrections.😂😂

Live, Love ❤️ and Laugh 😂 till the end enjoy your life journey.

Way back in my 40's I did use the YMCA for their equipment and classes. Then I got a really bad case of shin splints which put me down for a few months. Since then I've learned that the step instructor at the time concentrated on few step maneuvers and too many repetitions. Most of the trainers I've used since then (including my daughter) say that the bigger outfits just aren't a good fit for them. Their reasons are diverse but in general I get the impression that money is low, idle time is too high, and when they work they can't quite do what they want to. The gym I'm at now is owned and run by the trainer himself and it's a marvel. He has a fair amount of machines but generally we use free weights, resistance bands, stair steps, and the dreaded echo bike. But it works and I don't get hurt.

Thank you Colleen. I will definitely research these links. And I know what you mean about burpees. There are a few exercises like that which I just love to hate but you can't do without 'em. I also couldn't agree with you more that a stretching warm-up has become an absolute necessity.

I'm pretty much in the same camp Tim. I do believe that we can do better than simply holding off the decline. I feel that I'm in better condition now than I was in my 60's. I may have had a little more strength, but certainly not the endurance, flexibility, and balance that I've learned since then. I still think that some focused research by some smart young medical guru could help us all wade through these changes that I never even knew about until they started happening.

I just saw your final sentence about favorite workouts. I've been working with my new trainer for just a few years now. Recently he finally agreed to try group workouts and he's changed things up quite a bit. For years I've done series of exercises at a 3 set sequence with 8 to 12 reps per sequence. And I was alone with him to do them. With this new approach he's changed the method to what he calls 1 by 20. We set up 9 different lower and upper body exercises and do just one set of each 20 times or as close to that as we can with good form. If the exercise uses weights, we adjust them to make it hard to complete the event. If the routine doesn't need weights then we modify the routine via leverage. For instance start pushups from the toes and drop to the knees as required. I am beginning to learn the importance of keeping a record so that I can tell if and how much I'm improving. And then at the end of an hour we do these really rugged cardiovascular routines like pushing and pulling a weighted sled or a stair stepper or echo bike while being timed. The final push can be brutal at first. We'll be doing these for 6 sessions (twice a week for three weeks) and we have three different routines so each one will be repeated once over that period. So far I have seen more improvement in all aspects of my conditioning than I have ever felt before. And I haven't gotten hurt at all I think because there are days between workouts and there is not a lot of repetition. I've been trying to improve my pullup count for a while now and I've been stuck at 6 unassisted for a while. Pullups are part of this trial. Do as many unassisted as I can, then push up with my legs to the final pullup position and let myself down gradually for the rest. If I get to 7 pullups at the end of this session, I'll be one happy camper. The group really makes a difference for me. For some reason I work harder and happier in a group setting than alone, and here I thought I was just a cantankerous loner. Probably still true.

I’m close to 80 years old and have a family doctor, physical trainers and physiotherapists on my team that help me slow down the natural aging process. However, it is the latest addition to the team is the one that I want to talk about: A rehab specialist that makes a half hour home visit once a week. He is supervised by a physiotherapist and hence covered by my insurance. He compliments the work of the trainers and concentrates, mainly, with helping me with my balance, foot drop and gait.

Hi, i did sign up for Silver Sneakers at my local gym. i signed up for yoga classes, to get healthy and keep good with my balance. and to do pool exercises i found out iam not a machine kind of person and i do not like running. But, due health problems right now im going through a lot, my goal it to start in April and try doing it until i can get it right. I have made changes to my eating habits, trying to find classes for healthy eating is proven hard. Anyone have any suggestions?
Anyway, sorry about the ramblings. Don't give up on the medical field just yet, there are some who feel that once you are over the age of 60, that you should just go quietly into the night. I dont plan on doing that!!! I will continue to speak up! Don't accept no for an answer.

@gracer, I wonder if you might like to join the Virtual Walking Group here:
- Let’s Go Walking! Join me for a virtual walking support group
https://connect.mayoclinic.org/discussion/lets-go-walking-join-me-for-a-virtual-walking-support-group/
I'll get us started with some tips:
- Eating well: have ready-made healthy snacks available like cut up veggies and hummus dip or apple and cheese. If I have these things available and ready to eat, I don't grab the salty crackers or cookies or other not-so-healthy options.
- Physical activity: find people and activities you enjoy. If you like doing it, you're more likely to stick to it. Doing it with others helps, especially on those days you don't want to work out.

Grace, have you returned to the pool or yoga?