Diabetes exercise - increase exercise in your daily activity lower your blood glucose level, and you feel pleasant physical and mental well being.
Diabetes exercise - Physical Activity
Exercise plays an essential part in treating and preventing diabetes. When you care for your diabetes with physical activity, diet management, and proper medication, you will feel a difference. Also, it reduces your risk for problems with your kidneys, eyes, nerves, feet & legs, and teeth. You will also lower your risk for a heart attack or a stroke.
Is it possible to treat diabetes with exercise therapy alone?
Exercise alone can be a form of therapy for diabetes when your blood glucose level is below 200 mg/dl. And there are no diabetes complications — also, any other additional health conditions, such as high blood pressure or high cholesterol.
Tips before starting a regular exercise
- Trim your nails, cut your toenails properly to avoid nail growth damaging the skin in the toe edges.
- During exercise, wear properly fitted footwear (shoes) with cotton or woolen socks (help absorbs sweat for preventing infection).
- If your planned exercise involves your hands, then wear proper protective gloves.
- Monitor your blood glucose level before and after exercising and take necessary correction.
- Examine your feet before and after exercise to find any sours in the skin.
- During exercise, if you feel any discomforts, stop doing and continue doing the next day.
Benefits of Diabetes exercise - physical activity
- Helps lower your blood glucose level, measuring your blood glucose level before and after training will be an excellent motivation for you.
- Help lower your blood pressure, bad cholesterol, and raise good cholesterol.
- Reduces your body fat and improve your body’s ability to use insulin.
- It improves your blood circulation; thus, there is no more numbness, burning sensation in the feet.
- It lowers your risk for heart disease and stroke.
- Keeps your heart and bones healthy.
- Keeps your joints flexible.
- Helps you lose weight.
- Better utilization of glucose by the body, it improves your energy level so no more fatigue (gives more energy).
- Reduce your stress levels
Additionally, you feel more brisk and energetic.
- It reduces your stress, anxiety, and you feel mentally healthier.
- Help you to lose weight, which in turn better diabetes control.
- Strengthen your muscles and bones.
- Surely, you feel betterment in your entire body.
Before starting your exercise regimen, consult with your doctor for any medication change or dosage.
Be active in your daily life routine
- Walk around while you talk on the phone.
- Play with the kids; take your dog for a walk.
- Clean the house, do gardening, watering plants or rake leaves, washing vehicle.
- Take the stairs instead of the elevator or lift.
- Walk the most instead of using vehicles.
- At work, walk over to see your co-worker instead of calling or emailing.
Aerobic exercise for diabetes
Aerobic exercise makes your heart beat faster, and you will also breathe harder. Thus you burn high calories, and your lung expands and energizes the whole body. Doing the exercise for 30 minutes a day at least five days a week provides many benefits. You can even split up those 30 minutes into several parts, for example, you can take three brisk 10-minute each.
Start with some warm-up stretch, before you start exercising, and make to cool down after you finished your exercise. If you are new to exercise, then start slowly with 5 to 10 minutes a day. Add a little more time each week, aiming for at least 2 to 3 hours per week.
Some aerobic exercises to try:
- Brisk walk
- climbing stairs
- swimming or taking a water aerobics class
- dancing
- riding a bicycle (outdoors or indoors)
- taking an aerobics class
- playing (basketball, volleyball, tennis or other sports)
- in-line skating, ice skating, or skateboarding
- cross-country skiing
Can a person with diabetes do strength exercise
Doing diabetic exercises with weights, elastic bands, or weight machines three times a week builds your muscles and bones. It makes you overall healthy, flexible, and balanced. When you have more muscle and less fat, you will burn more calories because muscle burns more calories, even between exercise sessions.
Exercise regimen and stay motivated
Plan an exercise regimen is not that difficult; however, the biggest challenge stays motivated to your exercise plan. Plan strategies to overcome the hurdles that may derail and unmotivated you.
Tips to overcome these hurdles and to keep you stay motivated.
- Choose funny physical activities that make you happy.
- Choose a partner (family member, friend, or your pet) who can make you exercise, swimming or walking joyfully.
- Set simple and easily achievable goals for both the short and long term. Once you achieve your short-term goal, make you motivated to achieve the long-term goal.
- Take advice from a professional physical trainer, join yoga, swimming, skating, or dance class may help.
- Go to your bed early and have plenty of rest on days you exercise. Muscles grow and repair themselves during your restful deep sleep.
- Do not have enough time for physical exercise? Take a walk to talk to your colleague instead of through phone. Do crunches and jumping jacks while watching TV. Use steps instead of an elevator. You can take your pet for walking. Play with your child, do gardening, and wash your car. Take every opportunity to do exercise.
- Make a note of all the benefits you enjoy from exercising such as feeling energetic, increased alertness, physically stronger, mentally more relaxed, and so forth. It helps you feel pride, and it motivates you further.
Important when doing diabetes exercises
Physical activity for some may cause low blood glucose or hypoglycemia, so please have glucose tablet or gel with you, if you type 2 diabetes. Also, if you type 1 diabetes, keep a glucagon’s kit at your easy reach. Give glucagons as an injection with a syringe and quickly raise blood glucose.
If you have type 1 diabetes, avoid strenuous exercise when you have ketones in your blood or urine. Ketones are chemicals your body might make when your blood glucose level is high, and your insulin level is low. A large number of ketones can make you sick. If you exercise when you have ketones in your blood or urine, your blood glucose level may go even higher.
If you have high blood pressure or eye, problems then avoid heavy weight lifting or laborious exercise. It may worsen your problems consult your doctor.
If nerve damage from diabetes has made your feet numb, your doctor may suggest that you try swimming instead of walking for aerobic exercise.
During exercising, no sweat does mean no-benefit.
Your body sweats to bring back your body temperature, which is heating up during exercising, physical activity, or warm environment temperature (& humidity). Not everyone sweats at the same rate; each body behaves distinctly. Thus, you should not validate your exercise based upon the intensity of the sweat.
The downside of heavy sweating is that you lost fluid body content, so the risk of dehydration. Dehydration is not good; mainly, for people with diabetes, this makes your blood-glucose control difficult. Thus, you need to hydrate yourself with plenty of water.
Exercising tiredness and exercise benefits
When you begin, exercising your body may demand more oxygen than before this may make you feel some tiredness at the beginning. As you, continue doing the exercise, your lung's capacity increases to processes more oxygen.
It guaranteed to increase your:
- energy levels,
- improves your blood circulation,
- heart's health,
- decreases mental stress,
- enhances memory,
- increases the production of neurochemicals that repair brain cell,
- boost decision-making skills,
- growth of new nerve cells & blood vessels and
- Help you sleep better (restful sleep).
Can old age diabetes go for walking?
Aged diabetes individuals avoid doing minimum recommended physical activity due to their health restrictions, fear of fall down and injured. However, it is considering as their perceptions and not a fact.
The American Academy of Family Physicians reports, exercising is safer for most of the adults aged 65 and over. Even individuals with additional health conditions such as heart disease, high blood pressure, and arthritis can safely do physical activity or exercise after consulting with their doctor and physiotherapist. Regular exercise such as walking can help improve many of these conditions, additionally help lower the risk of falling.