Changes of season can definitely impact my exercise routine.
In the spring and summer, when it’s no longer dark when I wake up or getting dark when I get out of work, conditions are definitely more conducive for running.
During the winter, I make use of the stair-stepper downstairs, but sometimes I get busy and decide that tomorrow would do just as well.
But then ANOTHER new study comes along showing the importance of exercise.
Not that I didn’t already know the benefits of exercise for decreasing stress levels and improving all sorts of physical health measurements.
But now telomeres are involved. What is a telomere?
You might remember that a couple of years ago, several scientists won a Nobel prize in medicine for the discovery of their function.
Telomeres reside at the end of chromosomes in order to protect them from deterioration. When cells replicate, telomeres are cut and become increasingly shorter. If the telomere becomes too short, it dies or at the very least becomes dormant.
Many researchers now use telomere length to determine cell age.
Two recent studies, out of the University of Colorado (Thomas LaRocca) and Germany (Christian Werner), measure the effects of long-term exercise on telomere length, with some interesting results.
They found that young people, regardless of how active they were, have basically the same length of telomere.
The marked changes come only later when looking at middle-aged people (folks like me.)
Middle aged folks who were sedentary had telomeres that were about 40% shorter on average than young folks, even the sedentary young ones.
Those who maintained physical activity had not only higher aerobic capacities but also longer telomeres. Actually, their telomere lengths were only slightly shorter than that of youthful exercisers.
So next time you think of putting off your exercise regimen, think of your telomeres and improving the health of your cells. And improved cell health has so many implications for brain cells and their capacity for neuroplasticity.
Have you recommended exercise to your clients as a way to boost brain health? What are some ways you’ve found to motivate them to adopt a regular exercise routine? Please leave a comment below.
That certainly makes a lot of sense. I will be dragging the aerobic stepper from under the bed, where it has languished for many a dusty year.
Thanx.. I will be 90 in August this year. I guess my telomeres are ok. I will keep up my movements for sure now.
Thank you for sharing
Thank you for sharing!!
I recommend bodycombat to all my clients and co workers. Not only is it a great way to de-stress but it also has that right left movement replicating EMDR.
Excellent article…I would write more but I am going to go excercise.
Fascinating information. We all feel better if move. Cerbral is necessary but all indications point body, mind, soul are interconnected. Thank you. Everything is related and influenced by space, science, environment. Its both nature and nurture along with others past, present future.
Iv Been a huge advocate for exercise for over 25 years. The realization of my aching body with small children made me frustrated enough to make changes.
One of the best decisions iv ever made
No more aches than the occasional over used muscle, very minor in comparison to being able to get out of bed and play with my children.
I used my body as an experiment
And these are all the results iv seen
1, quickly healed injuries
2, plenty of energy
3, balanced me out emotionally through menapause,
4, sleep really well at night
Dont need to nap .
Gives me time to meditate while I exercise I put the 2 together in combination. So its mindful.
5, iv gotten so many compliments on how healthy I look and it’s true,I feel great. People tell me how young I look for my age. And the doctor tells me my blood pressure is as low as a teenagers .
I rarely need to see a doctor.
I make a conscious disission to eat like food will be my medicine and combine it with providing oxygen to every cell by exersice and now all that helps my mental state , not to live under the Eeyore cloud.
I love this new found science because it just confirms more of what Iv already felt through the evidance of my own bodies experiment.
,
“A body in motion stays in motion. A body at rest stops.”
As a survivor of every type of child abuse from birth to first marriage, I need to be conscious of taking care of myself every day. While I am really not keen on going to the gym, I do some exercises at home to stretch out my hip flexors and build resistance strength. Walking is something I do regularly and it makes me feel better physically, mentally and emotionally as well. When triggered, and C-PTSD threatens to knock me down, I try to go for a walk. It releases some of the toxins. And yes, I recommend exercise/walking to my clients.
Regular exercise – even walking – makes me feel better physically, mentally and emotionally as well. It’s a simple thing to walk a few kilometers out in nature – to feel well on every level. And yes, I recommend it to my clients.
Are there methods of achieving results when one is disabled with an auto immune condition and severe chronic fatigue please?
I’d like to hear some tips as well.
Personally speaking, with my current conditions, physical therapy is challenging. Probably because it’s so boring.
Sometimes, when listening to music I have a “spontaneous dance party.” No rules. Dance until you’re done. Have fun.
One doctor told me to: get in a pool and go swimming. I think is good advice if you have access to a pool.
The usual go-to advice: “just do yoga…” When I’m physically able to do it without further injuring myself, I’d love to! I’ll have to start as a beginner and modify poses.
Kundalini yoga helped save my life in the past. It seems strange at first because of the breath exercises, but that’s part of what makes it my favorite. I rally like the DVDs by Ravi Singh & Anna Brett. He talks you through the poses, explains how they work for your mind and body, and has a quirky knack for motivating and guided meditation.
I hope you find your thing(s) you can enjoy.
Since being diagnosed with type 1 diabetes I have been aware of telomeres. I used to love going for an hour’s jog on the Bristol Downs before work but injecting insulin makes me subject to hypoglycaemic incidents if I exercise, so I find my lifestyle has become increasingly sedentary. I still do fifty press-ups every morning, but have been told to ‘curtail’ my walking. The treatment, not the diabetes, traumatises me. This compounds my mistrust of healthcare professionals, who misdiagnosed me as having type 2 because their database told them I was over forty. Age is known to be irrelevant in what caused raised blood sugar levels, but four years after labelling me as type 2, treatable by lifestyle alone, they told me ‘we think you might have type 1 and we want you to inject insulin’. They were unable to test for ketoacidosis because my blood system constricted at the sight of a needle and eight nurses and three doctors could not obtain sufficient blood for the test. They remained adamant that I should take insulin so I asked “can you diagnose type 1?”. “No,” they replied. “Well in that case I will not accept your treatment for it” I responded. Eventually, three months later, the correct tests were performed and my antibodies were off the scale, so they had to diagnose type 1. “We often get it wrong” they added, without apology, as if to justify their mistake. Such mistakes could be reduced if the name ‘diabetes’ were not used as an umbrella term to cover two completely different conditions. Being an insulin user, I have not been able to find a personal trainer prepared to work with me. I don’t like gyms anyway; I much prefer fresh air, but I continue to do press-ups every morning to maintain my muscle strength.
I make a big effort to get some exercise everyday. When I was younger, it was just a natural part of my day. As I get older, I tend to behave more like my poor cocker spaniels who have about another 3 or 4 years of life left. It can be challenging but it is essential.
Learn Tai Chi from a real Tai Chi Master and you’ll be amazed at what that does for your brain as well as your body.
Appreciate being reminded of this. Meditation also preserves telomere length. See “Buddha’s Brain@.
I am always interested in looking at.links between brain health and physical health and activity Ruth.
Articles.such as this one serve to reaffirm the importance of viewing the individual holistically
H
It is fascinating learning about all this. How our life style impact our brian and find out that little but esencial changes improve our life.
Thank you – food for thought. I like to learn about genomics and this is relevan to me too (being old!)
Good morning Ruth ,
Thank you for all your insights and teaching,
Speaking of tricky Telomeres is very much the experience in
Intermediate hospitals and Psychiatric Hospitals.
The more we stimulate people ,is beneficial to them.
Not to mention ourselves to stay in the best shape mentally
and not just physically .
Starting children and youth to be athletic and active
It helps too those who suffer from issues of melancholy.
My experience of over 85 years of living,being active
I do not know if it’s just me or if perhaps everybody else experiencing issues
with your blog. It appears as if some of the text in your posts are running off the screen. Can somebody else please comment
and let me know if this is happening to them too?
This could be a issue with my browser because I’ve had this happen previously.
Appreciate it
Hi Ruth,
Exercising definitely helps lift a mood, especially in the darker months of Winter.
I find that running in place vigouresly for 30 seconds one time per hour really keeps me balanced and invigorates my brain. Mark Waldman’s NeuroWisdom teaches simple exercises that can be performed in 60 seconds or less.
These are some of my go to tools for maintaining telomere length as I enter middle age.
Thank you for continuing to educate me!
Very interesting- will certainly share with my clients & use it as a motivator myself!
Spectra Cell does telomere tests. Has anyone run it?
yes I remember reading about telomeres when I was reading about cancer. Personally I think children sometime during their elementary school years should begin learning about how to keep their own telomeres intact longer. A while back I had read or heard on the news how one school began their day with an exercise routine first thing in the morning before starting their day of academics and if I recall correctly, the young students overall did better. Naturally, a healthy breakfast, including wiser food choices must also make a more positive difference.
this information alone I am sure will motivate many. If all else fails, lol, it can appeal to one’s sense of vanity if all else fails at least for the general public as well as perhaps those who suffer with any form of mental illness.
Most of my clients report they love to dance. I recommend that dance at least 3x per week; in addition to walking 2-3 x per week. They usually are more agreeable to do this, if I commit to do it also. This joint effort also increases the therapeutic relationship.
One more reason to exercise and be active on a regular basis!
Thank you. This nugget of information will help motivate me and I can help give this very understandable and concrete reason for exercise to my clients.
If I was a young man who had not suffered a dilibating injury to his lumbar spine 40 years ago I would jump at the techniques suggested in your paper. As it stands I will endeavour to bring this into my counseling sessions with my inmates. Thank you
Wow very interesting, as a 64 year old still playing field hockey, i started as a 4 year old, and just recently down graded to a lesser division due to injury. I have found it beneficial for my health and well being. I found this article very intriguing.
That is such a valuable and insightful piece of research, makes a difference to your motivation.
can’t read it as the ad covers the page
Very interesting, I will aim to walk more regularly as it definitely drops off when the winter and colder nights come along.
I am wondering if a middle aged person who has been sedentary and begins exercising can increase the length of the telomeres or simply stop the degeneration (which would also be good). Has the science shown an answer to this? Thanks!
An interesting read – thank you
Exercise is critical. I had a brain aneurysm rupture in surgery as doctors were trying to wire a larger one. I was in trouble for about 4 weeks and in hospital for 6. After discharge and during follow-up , the neurologist in charge of the Stroke unit suggested taking up running. The radiologist advised: just don’t run any marathons. I walk for 30-40 minutes daily with my dog and will work in a short run during that time if I am not tired.
But diet also plays a role in telomere length. Watercress is supposed to be a great promoter of telomeres. It call seems to come down to the basics: diet & exercise.
Yes, I was wondering if you believe in DID. I have been in therapy for 20 years and I am not sure how to break through the DID. Partly because so many people do not think it is real.
Dear Melissa, I am sorry to hear, that you are not believed! I don`t know where you live… I know heartsync by Andrew Miller, (he lives in Florida) is an amazing approach. There are several people in the US and abroad in heartsync. Maybe just write them to ask where there are therapists. There are also skype sessions available! If you can`t find somebody of heartsync – keep on looking for a good therapists who is believing you and who is trained and experienced in DID… there are good therapists – but sometimes (unfortunately often) it takes time and energy to find them! All the best to you Melissa!
” HeartSync attempts to re-synchronize the various parts of your “heart” (really different parts of the brain), to make you whole again, recognizing that God himself (Jesus) is the only one who can bring a person back together again and rebuild the neural pathways that were broken by a lack of early attachment to the mother. The therapist is just a facilitator.” Is it legal for you to suggest that highly traumatized clients who have a dissociative disorder who cannot access adequate psychotherapy/healing turn to a belief system that incorporates the religious idea of merging with an invisible entity? I am agnostic and in no way mean to trivialize someones religious beliefs but to suggest what you have here, publicly deserves criticism. Traumatized people who are in desperate need of highly qualified DID specialists are vulnerable to being abused, manipulated and coerced into belief systems that simply do not reflect the research done. I have DID, I am slow to heal but never would I not report any counselor who suggested I seek a therapy merging with a specific religious figure to find healing. That is wrong.
Dear Helen,
Jesus is not a belief system. He is a person. He is the lover of our souls! You may choose to omit Him from your healing journey, but I assure you, He loves you and has not given up on having a relationship with you. Desperate people who have tried everything are the ones MOST in need of Jesus! He isn’t a manipulator, nor does He seek to hurt those already hurting. His heart aches with them and He is known as Comforter. How can that be wrong to invite someone into relationship with Him?
Amen! Jesus Christ is very real, and as co-creator of the Universe, with the Father and the Spirit, he is involved in bringing each one of us into existence. He definitely loves us and desires to help us achieve healing from any traumas we have encountered in our lives. Jesus says in Matthew 11:28 of the Bible, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” I give thanks to him for all the help he has given me as a survivor of sexual abuse from both parents.
Fascinating! I will think of this next time I feel like knitting instead of swimming lengths. Thank you!
thanks… fascinating and makes exercising just a little bit easier knowing that my telemeres are being supported.
Thank you for keeping this topic alive and circulating.
I am fascinated by this work. I am not sure how we -I- measure the telomeres. Is that possible for me? Are we able to lengthen them as we age or once they shorten, they stay?
I’d love to be able to measure results of exercise on my body/telomeres