Participants: Agatha Thrash (Host), Don Miller, Justina Thomas
Series Code: HYTH
Program Code: HYTH000190
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00:01 There are some people who don't like to exercise.
00:03 They think it's just sort of a drag, 00:06 and so they don't go out to exercise. 00:09 Introverts are of this kind. 00:11 They prefer what goes on inside the house, better than they 00:14 prefer what's going on outside. 00:16 But whatever your mental attitude is towards exercise, 00:20 you STILL need to exercise. 00:23 If you're the kind of person who doesn't like 00:25 that matter of moving, then we'd like to give you 00:29 some tips that I think will help you a lot. 00:31 So this program will be devoted 00:34 to a lot of those things. 00:55 Welcome to "Help Yourself to Health" 00:58 with Dr. Agatha Thrash of Uchee Pines Institute 01:02 And now, here's your host, Dr. Thrash 01:05 Now if you are that kind of person who just never 01:09 likes to exercise, one of the best tips that I can give you 01:12 is to get a companion... 01:14 a person who does like to exercise preferably. 01:17 Because if that person who DOES like to exercise 01:21 is coming to your house, or to your place 01:24 where you are going to meet your companion, 01:26 that person will ensure that you get out and get to moving! 01:31 So, that's one of the first things that you can do. 01:35 Select a good companion who loves to exercise, 01:39 or at least who wants to see that YOU exercise. 01:42 Now some of the benefits of exercise are very well known. 01:46 And Dr. Don Miller will tell us some of these. 01:49 You know, this thing about getting a companion, 01:52 I was teaching a class one time and the students were all 01:55 complaining that they just didn't have time for exercise 01:58 and they couldn't get out of bed in the morning... 01:59 I said, "I'll tell you what we'll do... 02:00 I'll meet and exercise with you. " 02:03 Well, all the students wanted to exercise with the teacher, 02:05 so at 5:15 every morning, I had the students out there, 02:08 and it really does help to have a companion to help 02:11 you exercise, just to get you motivated to do this. 02:15 The Bible has a very interesting quote, it says, 02:18 "The fool folds his hands and consumes his own flesh. " 02:24 If we sit around and do not exercise, we're going to start 02:28 losing our mass. 02:29 We're going to lose muscle mass. 02:30 We going to lose bone mass. 02:31 As a matter of fact, exercise lessens osteoporosis. 02:36 Every time you exercise, and stress your bones, 02:39 you cause the bone to call for more calcium, 02:42 which lays down more matrix, which keeps you from having 02:45 osteoporosis. 02:46 The Earl of Derby said something very interesting... 02:49 He said, "He who has not the time for exercise, 02:53 will have to find time to be sick. " 02:55 ...And that's very true, we find that exercise strengthens 02:59 the immune system and makes us stronger all the way around. 03:02 There are other benefits of exercise... 03:04 It speeds up recovery from surgery. 03:07 Years ago, when a woman would have a baby in a hospital, 03:11 they'd keep her in, on her back for a week. 03:14 Now, sometimes they have her walking out of the delivery room 03:16 I had surgery a number of years ago when I was stationed in 03:19 Key West, Florida, and after the surgery, 03:22 I asked the doctor, "Doctor, will it hurt me to 03:24 start running right away?" 03:26 And he said, "Well, it will hurt you, 03:28 but it won't do you any harm. " 03:30 So basically, I started right into my running program 03:34 ...true, it did hurt, a little bit of pain, 03:36 but I recovered a whole lot quicker... 03:39 The skin, the muscles didn't sit there and become 03:42 rigid and tense, and so exercise is extremely good after surgery. 03:47 It improved collateral circulation. 03:50 There are some people who say, 03:52 "My hands are always cold, and my feet are always cold. " 03:54 I recommend, get more circulation going, 03:57 and the best way to circulate is to get exercise. 04:00 So going out there... and when you exercise, 04:02 especially when you're taking your walks, 04:04 or whatever you're doing, SWING THOSE ARMS! 04:06 Get that centrifugal motion moving the blood out 04:10 to the end of the fingers. 04:12 There are 2 foundational health principles... 04:14 The first one is... The life is in the blood. 04:17 The second one is... Perfect health requires 04:19 perfect circulation. 04:21 Exercise increases circulation. 04:23 And to have perfect health, you need to have 04:26 perfect circulation. 04:27 It also reduces blood clotting, 04:30 and blood clotting is a major problem. 04:33 Many people are at risk for strokes and heart attacks, 04:36 but exercise will reduce that risk of throwing an inadvertent 04:40 clot which is going to cause some type of a coronary 04:44 or other type of event that our bodies really don't want. 04:46 Many benefits to exercise... that's just a very few of them 04:50 I bet you'll find some if you get out there, Dr. Thrash, 04:53 and that they start exercising. 04:55 Yes, all of those things are true that you said, 04:59 and the very BEST exercise for YOU is the one that 05:03 you will STAY right with as long as you live. 05:07 Now if it's an exercise that you really just DON'T like at all, 05:10 it's unlikely that you're going to stay with it a long time. 05:13 Some people love to swim, that's a good exercise for them 05:16 provided they're pretty skilled. 05:18 But if you simply stay in the water and just move a little bit 05:22 that may not be good enough for what you need. 05:24 Now when you are under 60 years of age, 05:28 the experts in exercise say that you can stay fairly 05:32 physically fit if you exercise 20 to 30 minutes 3 times a week, 05:38 that will help you to keep good cardiac health, 05:42 and will help you to be in pretty good physical shape. 05:46 But once you pass the 60-year mark, 05:50 then you need more than just aerobic exercise. 05:55 You then need some strength training as well... 05:59 Because there are a number of things that older people 06:02 MUST have out of exercise. 06:04 Only one is that of cardiovascular health. 06:07 Another is that they need to keep from getting 06:10 humped shoulders, and they need to prevent osteoporosis, 06:16 or thinning of the bones. 06:17 They also need to have exercises that will keep them strong 06:21 so that they won't fall. 06:23 It's an important thing not to fall. 06:25 Most of the breaks, most of the fractures that 06:29 people have in their bones after the age of 60, 06:32 come because the person simply wasn't strong enough, 06:36 or agile enough to make it so that they could keep 06:39 from falling... So that can be very helpful for you. 06:42 If you exercise for weight loss, you need more than just 06:48 aerobic exercise and strength training. 06:51 You also need long duration. 06:53 During the first 30 minutes of your exercising period, 06:58 you will be burning up mainly carbohydrates. 07:02 But during the rest of the time that you 07:05 exercise in that exercise session, 07:07 you'll be burning fat. 07:09 So, for the person who is overweight, 07:11 wants to exercise to lose weight, 07:14 they need to stretch out the DURATION. 07:18 ...LONG period of time. 07:20 An hour is just about minimal, 07:23 and then if you can do it for more than that... 07:25 as you exercise longer, you're going to have even 07:29 more loss of fat. 07:32 So, that's an important thing for you to know. 07:35 Now when you exercise, you need to be exercising at 07:39 about 50% or more of your maximum capacity. 07:43 Now how are you going to know what is that? 07:46 Do you have to be a physicist so that you can 07:49 figure these things out? 07:51 Well, I think there are some good rules of 07:53 thumb that can help you... 07:54 One is, that you should be able to do the exercise 07:58 that you do without getting so short of breath, 08:02 that you can't talk while you're doing the exercise. 08:05 So that's one key. 08:07 Now if the exercise that you are doing is of such a low 08:11 grade nature, that you don't have any problem 08:15 at all in talking, you're pulse rate has not gone up, 08:18 your respiration has not increased, 08:20 then you're not exercising at a fast enough pace. 08:25 You will get some benefit from it, 08:27 but it's not enough to make it so that you can have 08:31 all the benefits that you need. 08:33 Now as we get older, we also need flexibility. 08:37 Now flexibility makes it so that the shoulders 08:41 are not so likely to get rounded, 08:44 and that you're not so likely to shuffle as you walk along. 08:49 And shuffling increases the likelihood 08:52 that an older person is going to fall. 08:54 So, we'll show you some things in this program 08:57 that will help you with all of those things. 08:59 Keeping your bones firm will keep you having 09:03 very nice posture, and will also make it so that you're 09:10 less likely to fall. 09:11 So I've asked Justina to help me with a number of these things 09:15 and Justina can do some of these exercises to show you 09:20 just what you're going to need to do. 09:23 Now the first thing is we need strength training 09:27 when we get past the age of 60. 09:29 You can keep the upper body fairly strong by just 09:35 ordinary things that you can do... 09:36 You can lift weights if you would like, 09:39 but to do some leg presses, you need a gymnasium 09:45 unless you know some very simple things that can help 09:48 you to do the exercises that you need for strength. 09:52 So, one of the ways that you can do to keep your biggest 09:56 muscles strong, and healthy, is a half squat. 10:04 So, Justina, would you just show us with this desk 10:08 just how a person can make a half squat, 10:12 and do very well with that. 10:15 If you're not very powerful, you can do what Justina 10:18 is now doing. 10:19 Against a desk, you can support yourself, and go down as far 10:23 as you feel comfortable... 10:24 And then you can slowly come back up using your 10:28 hands and arms to help you. 10:30 So, do that again, and let us see just how that is done. 10:35 Now if you're a bit more strong, 10:37 then you can do this right against a wall 10:39 not putting your hands on anything, 10:42 except maybe on your thighs. 10:45 So as you do a half squat, put your hands on your thighs, 10:50 and they won't help you much when you rise up again... 10:53 Hold that for about 10 seconds and then rise again, 10:56 and your goal is to do that 15 times on a stretch. 11:00 You can do it all 15 at one stretch, 11:03 and if you're doing it, fine... That's good. 11:05 Now another very good exercise also builds up these 11:12 largest muscles of the body, the quadriceps muscles 11:15 here on the front of the thigh. 11:17 Another very good one is a knee extension, 11:20 or a straight leg extension. 11:21 And so, Justina, would you show us with this chair 11:25 just how that can be done. 11:26 A straight leg extension is simply done by moving 11:31 the leg straight out, and that will strengthen the 11:37 quadriceps muscles. 11:38 Now, as she is doing this, you will notice that 11:41 one of her legs has a weight on it. 11:45 And that weight can be moved from one leg to the other. 11:49 You can start with a 5 pound weight, 11:52 that 5 pound weight can be put on both legs, 11:56 or it can just be put on one. 11:59 And, as you continue to do that, that will strengthen 12:04 these largest muscles of the lower extremities, 12:10 and that will help you much in force and power 12:15 in muscle strength. 12:17 Now, we need to work also on flexibility. 12:21 And I'd like for Justina to show you now, 12:24 standing here beside me, what you would do 12:28 with a wall, with a door... 12:32 If you go into the door, you can lock both hands 12:36 or you may just lock one hand at a time on the door. 12:40 So Justina, here using me as if I am a door post 12:46 you show how it's done. 12:48 You just turn away from the wall, 12:51 and you can see that she's putting a good bit of force 12:53 on my arm... that is the door facing 12:56 Then she holds that for 5 seconds, 12:58 comes back again, and then relaxes it a bit, 13:03 and then does it another time. 13:05 So that repeatedly, doing that, holding it 5 to 10 seconds 13:10 each time can stretch out the pectoral muscles 13:13 and, of course, if you stretch out the pectoral muscles, 13:16 that will keep from rounding the shoulders 13:19 which is the first step in making the person get 13:23 round shouldered. 13:25 Now, because of the fact that the legs can get stiff 13:32 in the feet and in the lower legs, 13:36 we need to do a stretching exercise for the feet 13:40 and calves, and soleus muscles on the front of the leg. 13:45 So, standing... you can do this standing, 13:48 you can do it against a wall, 13:50 but you can also do it just plain standing. 13:52 Just bend your forward knee a good little bit, 13:58 and keep the backward leg straight. 14:01 Heel flat on the floor, and as you can see, she goes forward 14:06 on the bent forward knee, and then straighten up 14:09 and it's repeated with the opposite leg. 14:12 Hold that about 15 seconds, and continue to do that 14:16 until you know that your calf and soleus muscles 14:23 on the front of your leg are very flexible. 14:27 Also the feet become flexible in that way too, 14:30 because it puts quite a stretch on the feet as well. 14:33 Thank you very much, Justina. 14:36 I'm glad that we can show you how to do these simple little 14:39 exercises because that will keep you from shuffling. 14:42 And now, Don Miller is going to show you some exercises 14:47 for backaches. Dr. Miller 14:49 I'm going to ask Justina back 14:51 onto the set because there's something... All right 14:54 You know, I've read an interesting study about why 14:56 do we get so many backaches. 14:57 And, backaches are probably one of the major causes for 15:02 people going to doctors... 15:03 you've got backaches and headaches... 15:05 but there is a reason for it. 15:06 Now I want Justina to sit over here in this chair... 15:09 I'm going to ask her to do something very simple 15:12 I'm going to say, "Justina".. and we've already went 15:14 through this because she did it right because I taught them 15:16 when she was my student... 15:18 Justina, stand up... 15:21 Most people stand up just like that... 15:23 Now what was wrong with that? Let's try it again, Justina 15:25 Let's see if we could see what you did wrong. 15:27 Stand up... notice what she did. 15:31 She leaned forward... now sit back down again. 15:33 Let's go over this slowly, and see exactly what is happening 15:37 I want you to stand halfway up, the way you just did. 15:39 Get halfway up... look right there 15:42 All of her weight, from her head down to her waist 15:45 is placed on her back, especially on the lower back. 15:49 This is not good mechanics. 15:51 Now I want you to sit back down, 15:53 and stand up the way I hope you remember that I 15:56 taught you to stand up in class, okay? 15:58 Right! Basically, you slide to the front of the chair 16:02 you put a foot underneath you, and then what you do 16:05 is you put your hands on the chair and you push and you stand 16:09 straight up, rather than this leaning-forward thing. 16:12 So, that was very good. 16:13 Thank you so much, Justina. 16:14 Now, there are other things you can do to help 16:17 with back problems. 16:18 There's a thing called "passive exercise" 16:21 Now what is passive exercise? 16:23 Passive exercise happens to be massage. 16:27 If you've ever received a massage, 16:29 you know how good it feels to have a good massage. 16:32 And so, we need to learn how to GIVE simple massages. 16:36 Just go to a good book store, buy a good massage book, 16:40 and read some of the basics of massage. 16:42 Now there are hundreds of massage books out there 16:45 If you learn some of the very basics of massage, 16:48 when someone in your family or a friend of yours 16:51 is having back problems, DO some simple massages 16:54 on those particular muscles. 16:55 There are other good things you can do for back exercises, 17:00 and I think the best back exercise... 17:02 this is going to sound like an oxymoron... is exercise 17:04 The best thing to do when you have a really bad back, 17:07 is just exercise. 17:08 Now, many people when they start hurting there back think 17:10 "I need to go and have surgery" 17:14 It's been pretty much, some people believe, 17:17 and I believe with them, that unless you're bowel 17:20 function, or your kidney function is being impaired 17:23 by your back, surgery is not the best route to go. 17:27 There are other routes to go. 17:28 One of the nicest ones I like to do sometimes, 17:32 is do basically hanging by my ankles, or hanging by my hands. 17:37 Just finding a bar, grabbing hold of the bar, 17:39 and letting all my weight of my legs pull. 17:43 It's basically a tractioning of my spinal column. 17:47 It's extremely nice doing it upside-down. 17:49 There are some nice devices that you can get a hold of 17:52 One I use when I go to Austria... 17:55 I put my feet in it and I pull a little thing up, 17:56 which sort of tightens something against my shins, 17:59 and then they just grab these things and pull them back 18:01 and I'm hanging until a point where 18:04 I am swinging in the breeze. 18:05 Now, I can't stay that way very long because of the pressure 18:09 in my head, but I can stay there for a minute or 2 18:12 and it's amazing, the benefit you get from this. 18:15 And it's increased if before you hang, you have applied 18:20 some type of heat to the back causing the muscles 18:23 then to relax. 18:25 Relaxed muscles then can take care of this. 18:28 One other thing about taking care of the back, 18:30 and Dr. Thrash has alluded to this... 18:32 I had a friend that worked at a radio station, 18:35 and one day they went off the air, and here's why... 18:38 Some person out there in the woods, 18:40 did not like the light on top of that tower. 18:43 And so he took his high-powered rifle, and he aimed up 18:47 to shoot out the light... trouble is he missed the light 18:50 and he severed one of the cables. 18:53 Now, this is one of those types of towers that stands on a 18:55 single pedestal way up there in the air, 18:58 and is supported by cables 19:00 ...At the top, in the middle, and towards the bottom. 19:03 One cable caused that tower to collapse. 19:06 Consider that column, that tower, to be your 19:11 spinal column... 19:12 Consider the cables to be your muscles. 19:16 When those muscles get weak, you can no longer hold 19:19 that back in the proper form, and you WILL have back problems 19:23 And so, what we need to do is, at all times, 19:26 practice good posture. 19:27 A few years ago, it was a Thanksgiving day, 19:29 I was out in the woods, and I was pulling some 19:31 vines out of trees. 19:32 And one was especially hard to pull out. 19:36 And so I was pulling on this thing, 19:38 and to get some more power, there was another tree leaning, 19:42 and so I walked up the trunk of this tree, holding on, 19:45 and then I gave a MIGHTY pull... 19:48 the old pine tree leaned over, and I was saying... 19:51 "Great! I'm going to get it this time!" 19:53 And I took up a few hand lengths and then the tree 19:57 decided to stand back up again. 19:58 And as it stands up, the vine went, I went... I went swinging 20:03 HIT the tree, and as soon as I hit the tree, 20:05 the vine finally breaks, I fall on a little stump coming up 20:10 out of the ground and it hit me square in the back! 20:13 I had to crawl out of the woods in so much pain. 20:15 A couple of days later, Dr. Thrash loaned me 20:18 a back brace. 20:19 One of these things that you have to stand straight 20:21 when you put this thing on. 20:23 I found that I could not wear that thing longer than 20:26 ...Oh, 5 or 10 minutes before my back was really screaming. 20:30 As soon as I took it off, I relaxed. 20:32 I went back into bad posture. 20:35 Our problem is, poor posture. 20:38 If we would keep ourselves always properly aligned, 20:41 causing those muscles to pull us into proper form, 20:44 we would not injure our backs in the first place 20:47 and if you happen to get into a situation where you do 20:49 injure your back, you'll be much quicker to recover 20:52 from that particular injury. 20:54 And so the thing is, keep those back muscles strong 20:56 with good mechanics, good posture, some good exercises, 21:00 some massage, some hydrotherapy, hanging by your ankles 21:04 and you're going to find that your back problems 21:06 aren't quite as bad as you thought they were. 21:08 That sounds very good! 21:09 Now exercise is also very GOOD to keep people from ageing! 21:13 That's an important point for everybody to know... 21:17 from infancy to old age, 21:19 if you exercise, it will keep you more youthful. 21:22 As we pass the age of 60, that puts a premium on exercise. 21:27 And I have some things from the current medical literature 21:30 that I'd like just to refer to a bit, so that you can see 21:34 just how it prevents excessive ageing. 21:37 This is one that tells us about C- reactive protein. 21:41 Now, if you've had any medical background, 21:44 you know that that is a protein that's present 21:46 in the blood, that signals the fact that we have 21:50 inflammation going on inside the body. 21:52 Particularly, it indicates an ageing process that 21:57 makes you more susceptible to heart attacks and stroke. 22:01 Here is an article that's says that... 22:03 "Just by doing a little bit of low intensity activity, 22:08 it doesn't take very much... this low intensity activity 22:12 can safeguard your heart, and your brain against a stroke 22:19 EVEN if you don't lose weight" 22:21 Well, that's important to know... 22:22 that helps to make the CRP, or C-reactive protein to go down 22:28 Here is another one... 22:29 This one came out from the "International Journal of 22:32 Sports Nutrition Exercise and Metabolism" 22:35 and here, a large study was done showing that exercise 22:41 protects the kidneys against damage. 22:45 Now the kidneys, have a certain number of nephrons, 22:49 or functioning units... these are microscopic units, 22:52 in the kidneys, those we're born with. 22:55 But through our lifetimes, we have a little damage 22:59 to a nephron here, and a damage here, and these may die. 23:03 So we have a constant loss of a few nephrons 23:07 throughout our lives. 23:09 But this article, showed that exercise protects the kidneys, 23:14 particularly, it helps the kidneys not to have damage 23:19 from protein. 23:20 Now we know that diets that are very high in protein, 23:24 can damage the kidneys and the damaging effects 23:28 of protein on the kidneys was shown here in this study 23:33 to be protected. 23:35 The kidneys are protected by exercise from the damage 23:38 done by protein. 23:39 Now here's another one... 23:41 In a 14-year study, among a group of residents 23:47 in a home for the elderly, they found that just mild 23:54 exercise even, was a significant factor in the helpfulness 24:00 of these residents in this home for the elderly. 24:06 That came out in the archives of "Internal Medicine," 24:09 it was a very nice study. 24:11 And here is another study on the elderly... 24:14 It showed that 22 elderly people who just used a stationary bike, 24:21 these were people who were 88 years of age, or older, 24:24 and they just used a stationary bike for 20 minutes a day, 24:28 very small, very low intensity exercising... 24:34 They found that just this small amount of exercise, very modest, 24:39 caused a moderate increase in oxygen turnover in the body. 24:45 Now, oxygen consumption by the cells is actually 24:48 the gold standard of how physically fit a person is. 24:54 So to increase the oxygen consumption of the body, 24:58 indicates that a person is in better condition physically. 25:03 Now often, people will say... 25:05 "Well, how much do I need to exercise?" 25:07 Do I need to go out and spend 2 hours at a time, 25:10 or an hour at a time, or can I take the exercise 25:13 in smaller increments? 25:15 And the answer is... Yes, you can take the exercise 25:18 in smaller increments. 25:19 As an example, here was a study that was done 25:23 on a number of people. 25:24 They divided the people into 2 groups; 25:27 one exercised 10 minutes 3 times a day, 25:30 and the other group exercised 30 minutes once a day. 25:35 And the interesting thing was that they found that the 25:39 oxygen intake, or oxygen UPtake of the cells, 25:44 or the oxygen consumption, was actually GREATER in 25:47 those with 3 small periods of exercise, than in one large 25:52 period of exercise. 25:54 So don't feel that you have to have ALL of your exercise 25:57 done at one time, in one large increment. 26:00 Now at this time, Don Miller is going to show you 26:04 a little bit about plantar fasciitis... 26:07 and tell you something of that. 26:08 Okay, any time you see the word "itis," it means "inflammation" 26:13 And, plantar fasciitis is an inflammation 26:16 at the bottom of the foot. 26:17 I'm going to ask Justina up here again, 26:20 to help me with a little demonstration. 26:21 There is a simple exercise that you can do to help 26:25 with plantar fasciitis. 26:26 And Justina, if you'll just go up there... 26:28 And what she's going to do, is she's going to put her toes 26:32 on this little block of wood... a little block of wood that 26:34 would be higher, might be even better. 26:36 And then what I want her to do, keeping her heels 26:39 on the floor, and her legs straight, 26:41 she's going to lean into the table. 26:44 You can also lean into the wall. 26:46 And what she's doing is stretching the plantar fasciitis 26:50 area underneath her foot and up across the calcaneus 26:53 on the back of her foot, which is extremely good for 26:56 plantar fasciitis. 26:59 You might want to do this 10 times a day. 27:01 She can stretch it out for about the count of 10, 27:03 come back up again, rest for a moment, 27:06 go back down for a count of 10, come back up again... 27:09 And the more she does this, the more she's going to reduce 27:13 this inflammation on the bottom of her foot. 27:15 Now there's something else we can do for plantar fasciitis 27:18 Any type of an inflammation... and that would be 27:21 hot and cold contrast baths. 27:23 She could take a container of hot water, 27:26 and a container of cold water... 27:27 Hot to tolerance, put her feet in the hot water, 27:30 and leave them there for 3 minutes... 27:31 Shift them over to the cold water for 30 seconds 27:35 After she's done this, the inflammation is going to 27:37 sort of go out into the water because more blood comes 27:40 to the area, and the more blood that comes to the area, 27:43 the more oxygen. 27:44 Dr. Thrash was just talking about oxygen 27:46 Oxygen is very important. 27:48 Is that correct, Dr. Thrash? 27:49 That is correct, and all of these things 27:52 can help you to have a stronger and better 27:55 functioning skeleton! |
Revised 2014-12-17