Exercise

POSTED BY: JEWELSTAITEFAN
UPDATED: Tuesday, June 1, 2021 07:26
VIEWED: 2042
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JEWELSTAITEFAN

Friday, February 7, 2020 1:57 AM

I don't remember posting a thread on exercise here before. Maybe I did, but it fell by the wayside.

Here is a quote I found recently, I don't know where it was originally posted (it was not accredited):

Quote:
Originally posted by 1KIKI:
Well, after a couple days of treating myself at home with non-scrip medicines and therapies: cough syrup(cold), postural drainage(pneumonia), deep-breathing(asthma), pursed-lip exhaling(COPD), and cupped-hand percussion(cystic fibrosis), 1hour each, 2x/day, my symptoms are 80% improved.

I have helped others with their strength, stamina, endurance, breathing workouts, etc.
Several people have told me I have changed their lives with these simple exercises. Some have had asthma, or asthma-similar problems which became resolved.

I will try to mention some of them in this thread.

Improving strength of inhalation muscles, more forceful inhalation.
Increase lung capacity.
Simulated High Altitude.

Arm strength, inner bicep.

JEWELSTAITEFAN

Friday, February 7, 2020 6:54 AM

This is one which helps strengthen the inhalation muscles in the diaphram.

Think about the normal actions which help strengthen exhale muscles: sneezing, coughing, yelling, talking, whistling, etc.

Now how many for inhaling? Mostly just sucking on a straw. Sucking on a cigarette shouldn't really count.

Now think about the pysiologics of the diaphragm, the inhalation muscles and exhalation muscles. A cross section of the chest/ribcage could be like a large oval, or 2 lobes of ovals.
A person lying on their back:
The least amount of cross section area (volume) is when the top (breast) is closest to the bottom (back/spine), and the ovals are as close to flat as possible. This is when the lungs are exhaled, the sternum has been pulled near to the spine. The chest is collapsed.
The most amount of cross section area (volume) is when the ribcage is as close to being a circle as possible, the sternum is as far away from the spine as possible. This is inhale, when the chest is inflated or fully expanded. But muscles do not push away the sternum and spine, so how does this happen? Diaphragm muscles from the farthest walls of the ribcage (just inside your armpits) pull together, causing your ribcage to change shape.

Perhaps think of this in terms of a scissors jack. The muscles working the shortest distance also have the greatest leverage - these are the exhale muscles between sternum and spine. The absolute worst leverage are also the longest muscles, stretched from one side of the ribcage to the other. These are the inhale muscles.
The exhale muscles get all of the extra exercise during normal daily activities, have all of the leverage, and the least range needed to contract. So any exercise for breathing is not with the exhalation muscles - only with the inhalation muscles.

Lay on your back. Use a small weight to start, perhaps a couple pounds, or a phone book, dictionary. Put the weight on your breastbone. You ma hold it in place with hand or fingers, but these will not be used to lift the weight during the exercise. Never use excessive weight for this, nor any machine or spring loaded contraption for this. You must be able to remove the weight from your chest with one hand, if needed.

Fully exhale. Rapidly inhale as fast as you can, as if you are trying to fling the weight on your chest into the air. End of repetition. If you need or desire to perform a regular, normal inhale before the next repetition, that is fine.
Perform 5 repetitions, or if you are up to it, the normal 8-14 repetitions.
Since you have likely not performed this particular exercise before, this would be your break-in workout, so allow at least 3 days before repeating. Then repeat this activity every other day, unless your diaphragm muscles feel strained, sore, weak.
As with any other weightlifting exercise (for strength and endurance), when you exceed 14 reps in a set, then add a little more weight. If you cannot achieve 8 reps in a set, then reduce the weight (resistance) for the next set. You may perform more than one set of these in a workout day, I've normally recommended n more than 4 in an hour of time. If you spread 10 throughout the day, that should be fine. Always skip at least one day in between days of this exercise.

If you don't have wieght to place on your chest, a modified plan is to use water. Submerge your chest in water, up to your chin. The water pressure acts as resistance against your inhalation. But the water pressure is limited, and cannot easily adjust resistance.

JEWELSTAITEFAN

Sunday, July 12, 2020 12:06 AM

This is reminder for me.
High Altitude Training. And Simulated.
resistance
swimming 1 wave, arms/legs only, nose only.
explain how asthmatics can train to avoid panic, recognize onset, stop and open mouth, etc. And trigger event/episode in a controlled place and time, at their choosing.

JEWELSTAITEFAN

Tuesday, July 21, 2020 3:58 AM

I did start this thread before the Covid shutdowns, and for the reasons stated in the OP. I hae done a lousy job of fleshing it out as I had intended, still have work to do.

But this seemed the best place to post of this subject:
Co-morbidities.
Co-morbidities like heart problems, obesity, diabetes, and other factors related to or resulting from lack of exercise or physical fitness.

After Jiminy Cotta created the Department of Edjucamation, one of it's first tasks was to eliminate Physical Education from all curricumlum across America.
No more learning about the human body's need for physical exercise, fitness, or the practice thereof.
Since that same time period, automation in various industries, including farming, have eliminated many jobs which kids and teens could do during the summertime, such as baling hay, milking dairy, detassling, etc.
Combined with a prevalence of video games, where kids learn how to imagine they are exercising, pretend that they have mad physical skills (pushing 2 buttons together means you can do a flip-kick 10 feet in the air), and avoid any actual physical exertion.
And Obamination disconstined the President's Physical Fitness Tests in 2012.

The combination of these factors, and more, have resulted in the current state of Americans with excessive co-morbidities.

Thanks a bunch, Jiminy Cotta.

Brief History of the Presidential Fitness Test

Turns out the test can be traced all the way back to President Dwight Eisenhower. In 1953, Dr. Hans Kraus and Bonnie Prudden published a study on the fitness level of U.S. students. In the study, they administered the Kraus-Weber Test — a pass-fail fitness test which consisted of a single rep each of six basic exercises like sit-ups and leg lifts — to students in the U.S., Switzerland, Italy, and Austria. Nearly 60 percent of U.S. students failed one or more of the test exercises. Eisenhower was troubled — not least because the findings implied that our kids were unfit for military service, hence the slightly patriotic flavor of the whole endeavor. In 1956, he founded the President’s Council on Youth Fitness (now known as the President’s Council on Sports, Fitness & Nutrition).

6IXSTRINGJACK

Tuesday, July 21, 2020 8:01 AM

Still got all my PPF patches.

Maybe they're collectors items now.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

JEWELSTAITEFAN

Friday, October 30, 2020 11:03 PM

bump to remind me next week.

SIGNYM

Saturday, October 31, 2020 12:05 AM

Thanks for the info!

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Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake

#WEARAMASK

JEWELSTAITEFAN

Friday, May 28, 2021 1:25 PM

Alright, let me tackle high-altitude training.

Since many of you are not in an actual high altitude setting, just try to follow along by conjuring. High altitude would be near a mile high. Like Denver, or USAF Academy. University of Utah and Utah State are almost there. University of Wyoming is much higher. Some CA mountains likely qualify, but I'm not sure of the population centers there.

High altitude stamina and endurance did become an issue after 9/11 because the Afghanistan Mountains are high up, and low altitude training of our troops resulted in combat deaths in The Stans.

Conjure an exercise which tests your stamina, endurance. Could be bicycling, swimming, jumping jacks, some people think basketball, but that is not really continuous enough.
Running is something that most folk can follow, so let's use that as example.

When a person moves to or visits to a higher altitude environment, they experience a loss of breath, a difficulty breathing or sucking in enough air. The percentage of oxygen in the air remains the same, but the air pressure is less than lower elevations. (Remember most large cities and states are effectively at sea level. Even in WI where I currently am, our highest peak is around 1,500 feet above sea level - nowhere near a mile)
When the body is faced with a new demand upon it, the body adapts, acclimates. Many understand that when a body becomes subjected to a new weight of 35 lbs lifted in a curling motion every day (instead of the normal 12oz), the body adapts by building more muscle to accommodate this extra load - this is the premise of bodybuilding. If the greater weight is no longer repeated, then the body adapts by letting the muscle atrophy.
The same thing happens when the body encounters difficulty breathing. The body acclimates to the new environment, and full acclimation occurs in about 8 weeks. A body returning to lower elevations will acclimate by atrophying back to the lesser stamina levels.
Climbers on Everest must climb for some weeks, to a "base camp" at elevation, and then stay there for a few weeks just to partially acclimate, or they would be incapable of surviving at the top.

The vast advantages of high altitude training can be seen in sporting events, when visiting teams look slow and home teams run literal circles around them.

Consider running at lower elevation, running to the physiological "wall" when your legs and arms feel like rubber or spaghetti noodles, and you feel like you cannot go further. And then you get your "second wind" and you become invigorated and continue at your prior pace. This point is the end of aerobic respiration, and the switch to anaerobic respiration.

If you tried the same at higher elevation, you would not last nearly as long before "hitting the wall" - until you have spent about 8 weeks acclimating.

I'm not sure if I made that all clear. But I'm jumping to the topic of simulated high altitude training.

If you are at an endurance level where this second wind occurs at about 1 hour of running, then breakthrough studies have shown that what will extend, improve your endurance and stamina for future runs, is the amount of time spent AFTER switching to your second wind. This means that all of the time used up getting to that point will have very little effect on extending endurance, so it is almost a waste of time.

If you suddenly one day start breathing only through your nose (assuming you CAN breathe through your nose - but if not, just keep conjuring at this point), and keeping your mouth closed, then you will find it more difficult to maintain your breath. With normal breathing, the majority of air volume is inhaled and exhaled via the mouth, and only between 1/4 to 1/3 is through the nose. By keeping the mouth closed, this triples or quadruples the difficulty of breathing. This simulates high altitude environment - but without the need to relocate to a high altitude locale. More importantly, this is controlled, switched on or

JEWELSTAITEFAN

Tuesday, June 1, 2021 7:13 AM

Well, that last post does not seem very elegantly composed. I'm not even seeing where I should improve it. Seems I have just repeated the same spiel for so long verbally, without structure, that I have lost what the structure was 25 years ago.

I would be interested in critique, comments about how I should fix that.

For now, on to how to use Simulated High Altitude Training to address asthma and similar breathing difficulties.

First, asthma is an Immune System response. It effectively restricts the airway, or throat, tries to block air inhalation.

There is also "Exercise-induced Asthma" - and this can be very mentally and emotionally debilitating.
I knew a young woman who shared that she was trying to exercise because she had asthma, and she understood that increasing endurance, stamina was essential to improve their outlook/future with asthma. Her attempts at exercise were thwarted by the asthma attacking while she was trying to exercise. The less she could exercise, the worse her asthma became, which caused her exercise to be shortened/interrupted, which made her asthma worse. Obviously, this was a horrific downward spiral, without a light at the end of the tunnel, with no sunshine on the path ahead - highly depressing and debilitating. It only got worse and worse, until she was willing to listen to some suggestions from me. Which I am explaining in this thread.

Some of what people refer to as asthma is actually some other things - which all make things worse. This is particularly confusing to children, and they should understand the differences to help them take back control of their lives in the face of asthma.
To many, ASTHMA is a frightening boogey monster that suddenly looms out of nowhere to grip them and prevent them from breathing. For those who have experienced asthma, this is still a shock/surprise because children are running, playing, yelling, completely forgetting all about asthma - until it rears it's ugly head, all of a sudden.
For those who have this problem, they often experience the feeling that THIS BREATH might be the last breath they ever have on this earth.
That knowledge often creates ANXIETY, knowing that asthma will create this terror. Anxiety alone can also close off the airway, and/or create difficulty breathing, prohibiting deep breaths and/or calming breathing. This anxiety effectively multiplies the terror of asthma.
When these 2 physiological reactions bring about the realization that this might be the FINAL BREATH in this life, PANIC takes hold. Panic also has similar effects on breathing as both asthma and anxiety. Effectively assaulting the body with simultaneous asthma, anxiety, and panic, which each compound each other.

This will be important for children to understand - for we can help them take control (isolate, compartmentalize) of their anxiety and panic - which will then allow them to address the actual asthma, which we can use Simulated High Altitude Breathing to tackle. When only asthma is isolated, then asthmatics can learn to sense, feel, intuit, the oncoming or upcoming or approaching asthma attack, which gives them the tools to deal with it on their own terms.

So the way we can help asthmatics to combat this problem is by ARTIFICIALLY INDUCING an asthma attack - while including an "emergency" reserve access to air.
To be clear, it is helpful to have a friend or family member to work through this a few times, and keep your medication/inhaler handy until you are comfortable and confident you can do without - remember, an asthma attack always has the potential of looming in surprise. The young woman I helped told me she did the whole thing on her own (she lived alone in an apartment, with a dog).

Find some activity which you think will cause an asthma attack if you performed it enough. Running, jogging, jumping jacks, jumping rope, swimming, bicycling, etc are good examples - they are repeatable, so you can predictable do the same thing tomorrow, or over and over today.
Perform the physical ac

6IXSTRINGJACK

Tuesday, June 1, 2021 7:26 AM

I'd like to give my house some high altitude training.

The highest I could get within 100 miles of my house is Joliet Big Trash Mountain.

But I think all the methane I'd be inhaling would be counterproductive.

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Give me liberty or just come shoot me in my house. I'm so over this ridiculous reality.