Using Yoga (or Pilates) to Restore Your Health

The article Restorative Yoga Poses articulates with pictures how to restore the body and maintain and improve fitness.

Yoga can be used as an organized way to improve strength, flexibility, balance, psychological relaxation, and a way to age gracefully.

When walking by a yoga class, the first impression is that you have to be really fit to participate and you do not want to make a fool out yourself. The reality is yoga practice is on a continuum and changes according to your level of experience and fitness.

The biggest challenge is walking in the room and participating. Nobody is watching you except the instructor and the practice is an experience not a competition.

A new student will quickly discover how out of shape they truly are and the potential for fitness, weight loss, and stress reduction. I am usually the fattest person in the room and have lost >20 pounds in 2 years. My balance is dramatically improved and twist sufficiently to back the car down the driveway.

The advantage of a class format is that the most unmotivated person’s challenge is only attendance. The fitness workout takes care of itself. The upper body, core strength, flexibility, and lower body strength will automatically improve over time.

I wish I had begun when I was fifty and not waited till Medicare age. This can be a senior citizen’s panacea to chronic pain, equilibrium, balance, and terrible upper body strength. Start with a few restorative classes and easily progress to better health. The spiritual side can be a life-guiding support system and can easily add to the improved physical health.  

For those who do not wish to incorporate a spiritual component within their exercise program, there is the equally restorative Pilates, named after its founder Joseph Pilates.  Pilates training is very available, perhaps even more-so than yoga. All of the benefits noted for yoga apply. While some Pilates exercises require use of devices (the main one called a “reformer,” though it has nothing to do with discipline!), there are also mat Pilates exercises that can be learned online (YouTube), which can easily be performed in one’s living room.

Whichever you choose, Yoga or Pilates, it is wise to take a bit of time each day to pursue one of these, especially as aging advances (which it does!).  These two body-training programs will help keep you sane, flexible (in body anyway), and able to negotiate gravity, which (regardless of its newfound waves) seems always ready to find ways to trip us up.  Be wise, have fun, and pick one of them.

The Harsh Realities of Aging in the Workplace

One of the most difficult subjects for any medical practice is dealing with under-performance.  Viewed through its various lenses- including productivity, patient, staff and owner (hospital, etc.) satisfaction- under-performance is multifaceted and difficult to effectively engage from all perspectives.  An additional distortion is added when normal aging is thrown into the mix.

"You are as old as you feel" is a great saying.  However, if a healthcare provider does not have enough personal insight into his/her own actual competencies, normal workplace deterioration can, over time, lead to major interpersonal, financial, and professional problems.

Honesty with coworkers, employees, partners, and spouses is an idealized goal.  But such honesty- fraught with misinterpretation and potential conflicts- is rate, and seldom materializes.

Many solutions have been proposed, but a good resolution always requires creating a plan in advance to address performance and performance failures.  such a plan not only helps identify problems as they arise, but also gives concrete steps to support affected individuals, while anticipating potential snags that may appear over time.  Optimally, taking such steps as a group will get buy-in from co-workers and associates because everyone faces the possibility of such circumstances, at some point.

When a plan is not in place, steps may need to be taken.  Fortunately, some people have the insight to recognize increasing limitations.  However, others have to be firmly counseled.  Because discrimination on the basis of numerical age must be avoided, competency, rather than age, should be the basis for any action.  Age discrimination is not an uncommon claim in workplace litigation, consequently, some jobs to have mandatory retirement ages built into employment agreements.  Yet, all of us know of very senior individuals who show no signs of slowing down; and - on the flip side - we know of those whose abilities seemed to have tapered off far earlier than otherwise expected.

The best overall solution is to establish a retirement pathway, one that allows for more senior members to shoulder increased administrative responsibilities, and avoids the type of battle faced by many practices in which less experienced "Baby-boomers" wind up unintentionally in charge.  Rarely do the more neophyte understand issues that face their maturing predecessors, and the situation can become tense and uncomfortable for all concerned.  Honesty and communication are extremely difficult in hindsight; unless pathways have been created to prophylactically deal with such issues, the character, mood, and even the stability of the group can all be placed in jeopardy.

Prolonging Your Career!

Recently I have been unable to work full-time due to medical issues.  However, it is not due to any chronic or underlying condition i.e. DM or CAD, but to a relatively sudden onset musculoskeletal breakdown.

If you saw the overweight, balding, shuffling, poor posture, and moving slowly provider, THAT WAS ME!

It has become apparent to me, that proper physical conditioning is an absolute requirement for our busy, stress-laden jobs that require of us 5 miles of walking per shift.  I worked out in a linear fashion i.e. elliptical, treadmill, and stationary bike 3-4 times/week faithfully for at least 1 hour sessions.  This did not prevent my problems.

I went to the orthopedic specialist for help with this new issue, and the first thing he recommended was taking up yoga to loosen up my totally “stiff body”.  First attending “restorative yoga” (geriatric yoga where touching your toes means reaching your knees), it was apparent that I should have been doing something like this for years.

After 2 sessions, I could now back up car safely without the use of a camera display or grab things out the back seat easily.  The classes are difficult, but improvement comes with each one.

Everybody worries about their mental health, brain power, medical health but musculoskeletal breakdown needs to be added to the list.  Yoga is a good path; some do Pilates, some intensive stretching; in any case, paying attention to, and managing, muscular flexibility and mobility is key in our profession.