AIBU to think the pressure for ‘older’ women to exercise is wrong?

[StitchInLime]

So as a woman in my late 40s, I keep getting told (via ads, from some people in my life, via tv and so on) that I need to do strength exercises and cardio if I don’t want to suffer later in life. And yet, it’s the woman I know who did f-all exercise at my age and before who seem to be thriving in their 60s/70s (eg my aunts) and the ones who did more exercise at my age now have issues with knees, hips etc. I find it difficult to find the motivation in light of this. If you have opposite examples, please share as I really need to motivate myself!

I’m a HCP and see the importance of exercise daily in my older patients. I can tell the ones who don’t/didn’t move.

Movement is so important. Functional fitness is crucial. Muscles support your skeleton and weight bearing exercise improves bone density. We naturally lose muscle mass as we age and retaining it is so important.

I exercise because I want to be able to walk without a rollator, I want to be able to get out of a chair without assistance. I want to be able to bend and stretch and lift and push.

Oh my god
IMAGINE being able to do stuff at 55
Probably should just be waiting to die

Exactly. I‘m sure that by 'incredible' PP didn‘t mean ‚enticing to the „male gaze“' or whatever, just that they looked fit and healthy. Nothing wrong with that.

This. Ignore it if you want but you absolutely cannot deny that daily exercise (and it doesnt have to be crossfit or running 50 miles a day) lengthens life, strengthens bones, reduces inflammation and disease and is great for cardiovascular health. This is fact.

Regarding your anecdotes- I know smokers who got to age 90- they got their in spite of their smoking, not because of it and you will always find outliers to every circumstance. Doesnt mean smoking is a great thing to do....

Those keen to get moving but gently and at home, I highly recommend Leslie Sansone and the Walk at Home program. Lots of free videos on YouTube and if you like it, there’s an app with loads more that isn’t too expensive monthly. She incorporates resistance bands into a fast paced walk that doesn’t need loads of space and that you can use at your own pace.
I find modern gym classes too much, too intense and loud. These videos have changed my fitness and health beyond belief!

The NHS and government have to encourage healthy initiatives that individuals can do for themselves. There isn’t the money to continue to treat everything that comes up so if we can take control of some aspects of our health, that leaves more resource for the illnesses that do occur.
This is how I look at it anyway.

My mum is fit and healthy in her 80s and she doesn't do any of this stuff and never has! She is active but only by going about every day activities.

Running is fine as you get older. Distance running actually favours the older runner.

Mr Monkey is early fifties - he runs pretty much every day and works in running retail and a lot of women at his running clubs and shopping in his shop are forties to sixties.

He himself is a regular marathon runner and can run a sub 3.15 marathon. He has no joint issues, but he does vary his training and is increasingly doing more yoga to strengthen his core (my influence as an ex martial artist and daily yoga practitioner).

No, it's about heart and brain health, preventing dementia, strengthening bones and maintaining muscle mass.

@Rodders92 so the sort of exercise that is best is swimming/yoga/weights/pilates? Preferable over running or normal gym exercise? Interested to know as I need to get moving and running seems tempting as it's cheap and easy but it does seem to bugger the joints.

Forgot to say that exercise has also been found to have a profound effect on improving mental health and has been found in studies to be as effective as anti depressants for mild-moderate depression. So its not just physical either.

I follow a woman called reclaim.movement on insta. She’s all about moving, so you can keep doing the things you want to. Stuff like getting up from the floor, or lifting things up. Being able
to get down to the floor. I already have osteopenia, I don’t want to go to the gym but walking, stretching and moving my body make sense to me.

@Comedycook I used to hate exercise too, so I built walking into my life ( easy for me as I am in London). Instead of taking the Tube or a bus, I just walk. It often adds up to more than 20,000 steps a day. Seems easier to do if I am on an errand rather than making it a separate thing. Swimming I have managed to do by building in a treat every time I do it.
Would that work for you?

I also think yoga can be transformative, if you have the right teacher. It's truly mind and body working together. But the wrong teacher can make it all really annoying.

Definitely agree to lay off the cardio and running etc but strength training and protein rich diet is absolutely crucial!

Exercise is beneficial but I have a fair few relatives of both sexes who lived healthy into their 90s. None ever set foot in a gym & were at least slightly overweight. Lots of walking & low stress though.

Depends on the exercise. Strength training, yoga, Pilates good. I would think pounding pavements running is not. Other factors luck, alcohol consumption, nicotine.

It's not pressure though is it, its highlighting the benefits of exercise. Many people don't bother being consciously overly active in their 20s/30s/40s and your body can usually compensate okay for this; it becomes a bigger issue as you get older and anyone who values their health and mobility should look to incorporate strength exercises and stretches into their routine if they can.

As someone in my 50s, I think it's more about staying active. So someone who walks everywhere or has an active job but doesn't go to gym or regular sports activities could be in better shape than someone who works out once or twice a week.

I know 2 ladies in their late 70s, one drives everywhere but goes swimming regularly and brags about it but isn't in great shape. The other is out walking daily and working in garden (just doing what she enjoyed) and is healthier by far.

I don't think it's right to shame or put pressure on someone but it is important to be active in some way.

This. It’s a bit like smoking anecdotes. Some people used to say that they know someone who lived into their 80s or 90s and were heavy smokers. All the research shows that these people are exceptions.

It’s fine to choose not to exercise but you can’t really pretend that it won’t have an effect on your health and longevity. I recommend reading some of Dr Peter Attia’s work if you want to read about the research around exercise (aerobic, strength training, etc) in a more accessible way than ploughing through scientific journals.

the ones who did more exercise at my age now have issues with knees, hips

I'm an OT so have seen lots of people for rehab after operations etc. This has not been what I have observed at all- in fact, the complete opposite. Its the people that have exercised who have the best outcomes and reduced risk of physical health issues in general. So I completely disagree with this. Plus, you later stated they walk a lot which is considered "exercise", so...yeah.

All the anecdotal examples of someone who is fine and never did any exercise do not refute all the scientific evidence. My mum is fit and healthy and has smoked 2 packs per day for the past 50 years, still not something I would recommend.

Surely people exercise more now than ever but perhaps overall they are less active? Healthy life expectancy hasn’t changed has it?

My mum is 80 and beat me in an arm wrestle 😂.
She has proper bulging muscles and is so strong and active. She can do a proper squat for 5 minutes and walk for miles.
She never does exercise per se but is active through gardening (hours every week), does lots of digging, walking etc.
Unlike some of her friends who are the same age but "elderly" she is not. I hope to be the same but the arm wrestle has shown it's unlikely.
I don't want to be like my MIL who at 77 struggles to get out of a chair.

As a 77 year old who never exercised as such but walked LOTs from a very early age, I do worry that some women (and men) who take the 'exercise religiously every day' can result in overdoing certain joints muscles etc.

I still walk the dog for around 1 hour a day - OK I am slower but manage it.

I am not over weight and eat a vegetarian diet plus fish - which I have done since I was a young woman.

Because I have a joint problem in my one leg - knee - I do home exercises as that way I can monitor what I can realistically achieve.

I wish I was as old now as I was in my forties when I thought I was getting on a bit 😂

As others have pointed out, there's a big element of luck (genetic and in terms of socioeconomic privilege) involved in healthy aging, but there's also lots of good quality evidence to show that statistically exercise is beneficial and that resistance exercise can protect against loss of bone density and muscle volume and even lead to small increases in both well into old age. And there are no downsides to avoiding osteoporosis and sarcopenia.

I'm sure we could all point to someone who never moved in their life and lived to be 100. I've also known two lifelong smokers who made it into their nineties. Those people are outliers in the same way that people in their 80s and 90s setting age group athletic world records are outliers, and not evidence that "if they can do it, anyone can do it".

My advice to everyone, personally and as a (retired) health care professional, would be to find one or two forms of exercise you don't mind doing (actual enjoyment may follow) rather than forcing yourself to keep doing something that makes you feel as if you've just lost an hour of your life that you'll never get back, and keep doing them regularly.

And for every woman who feels pressurised to do exercise they don't want to do, there's likely to be a heavy-lifting, marathon-running, netball-playing, mountain biking woman in her sixties being told to sit down because all that activity can't be good for her "at your age".

For anyone interested, here's a review of research into the effects of weight training on osteoporosis in post-menopausal women. Please note, these are post-menopausal and already have osteoporosis.

As far as I know, there is NO evidence that training before menopause will offset bone loss after. There's an assumption that strengthening the bones beforehand will make subsequent loss less damaging - but that's very like saying that having thick hair will save you from very thin hair when old (not true, if you're gonna lose it, you'll lose it).

The outcome of this study is that 12 months of moderate intensity resistance training, 3 times a week, improves bone density. It does not improve the hip bones. And continuation after 12 months does not bring further improvement.

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fphys.2023.1105303/full