My Mother's Exercise Program

Song:  Zombie

Group:  The Cranberries

A person who foregoes training of the body...

who, instead, lives a sedentary lifestyle...

never experiences the full richness of life.

Just a few months ago...

my mother was merely existing.

She had settled into a zombie like cycle of watching TV...

eating junk food...

and sleeping poorly.

She merely stayed in her house...

rarely venturing out.

Three months ago...

I had invited her from her California home to my home in Reno, NV...

to allow me to train her in the basic three of good health

(Nutritious and Delicious Diet / Exercise / Deep Restorative Sleep).

She had awakened from the land of the walking dead...

and started to really live life.

My mother is 76 years old...

and she had never engaged in any long term exercise program...

in her life.

She came to me 20 lbs overweight...

physically weak...her balance poor...

and with no real lust for life.

I had placed her on a very simple program of weight training

twice a week (one day for the lower body...one day for the upper body)...

and, initially, a simple night walk three times a week...

which I then cut back to twice a week as she was losing weight too quickly 

(she had lost 20 lbs in two months).

The focus of this article is her exercise program.

In later articles...

I shall delve into her diet.

The most basic and result producing weight training consists of 

exercising the largest muscles of the body.

For her Sunday training...

I have her do Trap Bar Deadlifts.

For all of her weight training...

I do the same type of training:

Singles for 10 - 25 sets for each exercise.

I just have her do two exercises for each of the two days a week 

she trains with weights.

Sunday:

Trap Bar Deadlifts

Pull Ups (on an incline board)

Thursday:

Bench Press

Bent Over Rows

The program is very simple:

Start with approximately 80% of the comfortable max weight as a starting point.

Do a single repetition of one exercise...

do the next exercise for a single repetition...

rest for 1 minute.

This is one set.

For the starting point for the particular weight...

do ten sets...and that is it.

With each successive week...

add three sets until 25 sets are completed.

For the following session...

add 5% of the weight to the bar...

and take the sets back down to 10 as the set starting point.

This is the schedule:

Week 1:  10 sets

Week 2:  13 sets

Week 3:  16 sets

Week 4:  19 sets

Week 5:  22 sets

Week 6:  25 sets

Add 5% weight - Week 1:  10 sets and work your way back up.

The cycle will continuously repeat...

until you feel you haven't fully adapted to the exercise.

If this is the case...

take a week or two off weight training...

and resume where you had left off.

Also...

in all movements...always...

exhale as you exert...

inhale at the top of the exercise...

exhale as you put the weight down

(you should always have your lungs half full at the end of each exhalation...

you risk passing out if you fully exhale).

This applies to all of the weight training exercises.

Sunday's Routine

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(my 14 year old son...Alex...spotting his grandmother on her bench presses)

Thursday's routine

Why these particular exercises?

The Standard Deadlift is one of the lifts which exercises all of the major muscles 

of the body...while allowing for maximal weight to be used...

which in turn...allows for maximum benefit for the whole body.

However...

the line of force applied is offset from the center of the weights.

This results in tremendous sheer forces on the lower back.

The Trap Bar Deadlift

Besides exercising all of the largest muscles of the body at once...

it keeps the force used...in line with the weight.

The Trap Bar Dead Lift allows even more weight to be lifted...

without the tremendous shearing forces on the lower back...

not only making this a safer exercise to do...

but as it allows even more weight to be lifted...

it does even more good for the whole body.

The Pull Up

This exercises the largest upper body muscles in opposition

to those being exercised by the Trap Bar Deadlift.

It is important to keep the body balanced in strength in opposing muscle groups.

Posture can be adversely affected otherwise.

The Bench Press

This exercises the largest muscles of the upper body which push.

The Bent Over Row

This exercises the muscle groups in direct opposition to the Bench Press.

Also...

The Trap Bar Deadlift and The Bent Over Rows...

strengthen the muscles which bring the shoulders back...

and in line with good posture.

The Pull Ups keep the shoulders back and down...

and strengthen the pulling muscles as well.

Now...

on to the night walks.

Merely start out walking at a leisurely pace...

and for as far as one feels comfortable...

then turn around and walk back

(start out with an empty rucksack on if you can).

With each successive night walk...

add one street light's distance to the walk out.

Work up to approximately 2 miles.

When you can do the 2 miles...

add one fistful of sand to the rucksack after each walk...

or after each week of walking

(use a laundry bag as a liner).

Over a period of many months...

you will be walking with many pounds of sand...

and the effort expended will feel no different than you had felt at the beginning.

Why the sand filled rucksack night walks?

When an appreciable amount of weight is carried for 1 - 2 miles...

it also greatly strengthens the whole body (aerobically as well)...

as well as greatly stimulating the skeletal system to grow much more dense.

Now...

why night walks as opposed to morning walks?

This ties in to weight loss and deep restorative sleep.

How so?

First of all...

eat nothing for a good 6 hours, or so, before you bed down for the night

(with the exception of immediately after weight training.

One small protein drink (high protein Ensure) is okay...

and will help with recovery).

Drink only water after your last meal until you go to sleep.

Never drink any caffeinated or sugary (even diet) drinks...

just water.

Approximately two hours before you are to sleep...

exercise, stretch, and take a hot shower.

Your body is now primed for a relaxed and deeply restorative night of sleep.

Exercise drains excess energy and stress from the body and mind.

In addition...

exercise dramatically raises the metabolic rate...

especially in the thermic response of the body

(the body is producing much more heat...

which is countered by flooding the capillaries near the skin

to rid itself of the excess heat.  You become a little radiator of heat.

This is what burns most of the calories continually for many hours afterwards).

Now...

with having had no food for six or so hours before going to bed...

and after exerting yourself for 45 minutes to an hour...

the body's store of glucose (stored in the liver as Glycogen)...

and in the muscles of the body...

is about used up.

As your body continually burns calories all through the night 

at a dramatically raised rate due to the exercise...

the body is forced to release more calories from its fat stores.

This is the most effective means of losing fat.

1)  Do not consume calories within 6, or so, hours of bedtime.

2)  Do a continual aerobic exercise for 45 minutes to an hour

(walking is gentle and effective)...

just before bed time.

3)  Hydrate...but consume no calories afterwards.

4)  Stretch, take a hot shower, and go to bed.

My 76 year old mother, who was 20 pounds over weight...

had lost 20 lbs of fat in two months doing just this.

She had also gained in strength...

energy, and had a greatly elevated mood.

As you increase the amount of weight used in weight training...

you will gain some weight due to the fact that muscle is heavier than fat...

however, you will lose even more fat...

as muscle is far more highly active (burns calories).

This will result in your posture improving...

and your body shape filling out in all the right places...

and the slimming down of the fat which is in all the wrong places.


Conversely...
a major cause of obesity is by eating too near bedtime.

With the metabolic rate slowing down while you sleep...
and with the addition of many calories...
and with the liver stocked with glycogen with no more room to store any more...
it is stored directly as fat.

You WILL continually add pounds this way.


Do the opposite...
and you will continually shed pounds of fat...
and you will sleep much better.

However...
if like in the case of my mother...
you start to lose more than 10 lbs a month...
take out one of the night walks a week.

Losing weight too quickly is not good.
You want your skin to be able to conform to your new shape
in tandem with your weight loss.

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Recap:

Especially for the elderly...

the eventual lifting/carrying of an appreciable amount of weight must be the goal...

if they are to protect their bones from Osteoporosis...

 prevent Muscle Insulin Resistant Diabetes...

 prevent Deep Vein Thrombosis
(and the full or mini strokes associated with it)...

and to keep their bodies mobile and strong enough

 to be able to dance the night away...

until their final slumber takes them away...

still sharp of mind...and strong of body.