To not want to exercise

[beewaspfly]

help me out here. Wrong side of 40, in the thick of perimenopause. All of my friends, and I mean all, have started exercising like crazy in the past few years- even the ones I’d least expect. My GP keeps telling me I HAVE to start strength training or I’ll have an unbearable later life.

but…I don’t want to. It’s just so tedious. I hate the gym, hate PT even more, hate classes (have tried several), hate home work outs, even the short ones. I don’t get any endorphin rush from it or whatever. The prospect of doing it ruins my day - it’s better if I do it first thing but even then I hate every minute.

id rather just be walking somewhere nice, meeting friends, working, napping, catching up on tv and eating amazing food with my family, reading and enjoying my life without the sense of impending dread.

im size 10, love to walk for HOURS every day, slim but not really toned (ok, a bit flabby in some areas), feel pretty healthy on the whole. Can’t I just keep doing what I’m doing? Please??

my mum is in her 70s and fine doing what I do, although she has had some falls lately. Dad says he wish he’d worked out as he’s such a weedy skinny old man now (his words). But they’re fine. My grandmother is in her 90s and going strong.

why do I have to do this? Why is everyone else doing this? Someone tell me one good reason and I’ll stop moaning

Then all you need to do is walk a bit faster so you are slightly out of breath. That means your heart is working, your lungs are working and you are using the big muscles in your legs. Job done. If you walk in an area where there are lots of trees you get the added bonus for free of breathing in good oxygen. If you walk with a friend or two you get social interaction which is good for your mental health. Using Nordic poles will help to tone up arms and build upper body strength.

One thing that is worth building up is your balance, and it’s not really exercise, just good practice. Try to go barefoot in the house as much as you can and really make contact with the floor being aware of all the areas of your foot touching the floor, especially across the balls of your feet. Make sure you can stand on one leg( both legs!) . When you are standing at your kitchen surfaces or sink put your feet very slightly apart, keep your back straight and raise yourself up onto the balls of your feet then push down so your heels touch the floor again and repeat for a few minutes, you can place your hands on a flat surface if you need to. Having good balance is essential if you want to avoid “ having a fall” later in life and will also improve your posture . Learn how to do a deep squat ( see you tube) great for balance and keeping your hips and knees mobile.

Haven’t RTFT sorry but just wanted to say @beewaspfly you could add wrist/ankle weights or a weighted vest for your daily walks if you want to up your exercise without really changing what you’re doing!

25 minutes -

3 sets of squats
3 sets of lunges
planks or wall pushes
standing on one leg for 3 minutes each leg
lifting weights- 3 sets each of bicep curls, hammer curls, tricep dips

Yeah yeah everyone is talking about strength training now, like if you don't do strength training you're going to die right here tight now. Honestly it sounds a bit like the new stuff.
Few decades ago eggs were responsible for cardio-vascular diseases. Now milk is the enemy. It changes all the time, some might be totally legit but next year there'll be a. ew thing to do, to measure and to perform at.

I'll personally keep doing what have been doing and what the old ladies in my family have been doing: eat fresh homemade food, keep being active, and have fun.

Of course you don't have to exercise, you already do plenty of walking.

None of us know how it's going to pan out for us.

Ten years ago I was a size 8 and my body felt like it did in its 20s.

Ten years on im a bit overweight, got an autoimmune condition which impacts my mobility and balance and some days I feel 80. There's nothing I could have done to change that.

But generally the more you do now, the better you'll be - if you can face it.

Can you explain how strength improves if not through muscle growth?

If you're looking at your mum being wobbly and a bit frail in her 70s, I'd be a bit nervous to be honest. Your life expectancy will be in the 85-90 range at least, given you still have grandparents doing well in their 90s potentially a fair bit older. Do you want to spend upwards of 15 years of your life unsteady and frail?

Can you reframe exercise as something you get to do over something you have to do? Would going with a friend and making it more social help?

No judgement, I'm working through this myself, I don't enjoy it/dread the thought but know its the best for my health.

Milk is not the enemy.
Not sure where that's coming from?

The issue is that people are living longer but not in a healthy way.

Nowadays most people can be treated successfully for heart disease, and live longer. But they are often housebound with diabetes or osteoporosis (broken hips that are never quite right again.)

It's not new stuff.
Our lifestyle is more sedentary than ever. In the old days people worked on the land, did manual labour, walked to work etc.
They died because there was no modern medicine (antibiotics and vaccines)
.
Now we have medicines but other diseases due to being overweight and not taking exercise are kliling people.

Kale hasn't stopped being good for you. Having strong muscles won't stop being useful in older age.

People realise these things and then they're big for a bit, but the benefits don't stop being there just because an influencer isn't banging on about it every day anymore.

Wrist and ankle weights! I wear mine around the house on days I can't be arsed going to the gym.

I can totally walk up a hill, I just had sweating and feeling that burn in my thighs. I don’t find it pleasant.
im sorry if im being childish. I’m just trying to be honest here about how I’m feeling and convey the extent of it, as I would never dare to say it out loud. it’s a genuine, day-ruining loathing. Aversion is the right word.
I don’t like feeling ‘in my body’ I guess is the way I would put it.
Also I suppose I’m hoping someone could say some magic words that would either make me feel like I’ll be fine not doing it OR come up with a solution that isn’t just ‘but you have to’

Fine - no one gives a toss. There are no 'magic words'. You don't need to apologise...

Not understanding why it ruins your day?

Sorry to sound thick. I'm rubbish at exercise but I might be able to fit this in.

What counts as a set?

I did (horrible experiences at school) until I discovered that audiobooks plus rowing machine equals an hour of peace and quiet. I can row with my eyes shut and just lose myself in the book.

A set is 8 to 10 reps.

So lifting a 2 or 3kg weight 10 times is one set.
3 sets is 30 lifts.

3 x 10 lunges = 3 sets.

I hate it too and also know I need to start as I want a healthy old age.

it’s about bone health ultimately and keeping the strength there to be able to carry shopping bags, get on and off a sofa etc. so I will start. Just not yet 😂

What about doing things in your usual routine that add in some effort? Like, while the kettle boils, do that thing where you sit on an invisible chair, with your back against the wall?

I hate, loathe and detest things that require me to get down on the floor. I hate my head feeling low, and fear feeling trapped on the floor- sitting on the floor is fine. I can do planks against the wall, though. Less effort than on the floor, yes, but I’m not fit enough to plank properly anyway.

You need to find something you don't hate. I'm in my 60s. I also hate the gym. Just walking into a gym genuinely brings tears of boredom to my eyes. And I've only ever found one good pt and he moved back to America decades ago.

However I love dancing, reformer Pilates and yoga. Doing those 4/5 times a week plus walking about 5 miles a day mean I'm leaner, stronger and more flexible than many women half my age. It also helps that I live on a steep hill!

My motivation is having watched my mum and her sisters when they reached their 70s become increasingly frail, shuffling around on walking frames, unable to get themselves to the loo unaided or make their own beds. No major accidents or incidents for any of them , just an inexorable loss of mobility, strength and independence with a knock on effect on their mood and self esteem.

That might well happen to me eventually anyway but I'll do what I can to delay that time.

Building lean muscle has never not been beneficial. Improving your core strength has never not helped people to put their own socks on and put away their own shopping in later life. Strong muscles which support balance has never not reduced the risk of falls in older adulthood. None of this is new or faddy, what might be is the way that people achieve this (eg Hyrox seems to be the thing just now)

Walking is exercise but yes as saying goes don’t use it you loose it so if don’t use your muscles then yes sadly they will decline in strength. I walk, do reformer once a week and a yoga class. Got a kettle bell which I’ve not used yet. I’m 42 and def more achey now and if I miss classes I’m very stiff so dread to think what I’d be like in my 70’s if I didn’t exercise!

Following with interest as someone approaching 40 with 2 young children under 5. I walk usually for an hour a day (either to school and back or on a lunch break), usually involving a steep hill, and do yoga once in a blue moon but it seems not enough having read this thread. Does anyone have tips for balancing exercise with the demands of raising young children? I also work part time.

OK, so I love the gym, but you're a grown up and can decide what you do or don't want to do! If you walk and enjoy walking, keep doing that! It's important to enjoy what you do!
You can do body strength exercises that you won't even think about - standing up and down from the chair a few times while you are watching TV for example. Do it with a cup of tea in your hands so you can't use them to get up with.

I do think the issue now is a lot of people drive, have sedentary jobs, have a cleaner and gardener etc. Things like decorating or DIY, they get someone in to do it. They need that extra exercise so easier just to advise everyone to do it.

My grandma lived in a 4th floor apartment with no lift all of her adult life and I think all those stairs every day (often more than once a day) made a huge difference. I remember her doing 5 minutes of light stretching daily, but that was it. She lived long and healthily.

I’m nearly 60. I live in a 3 storey house, up and down countless times a day. There’s a flat below me (Victorian conversion) so 4 storeys including that. I clean. I garden. I don’t drive so walk everywhere. I do all my own decorating, DIY etc (learnt a lot from YouTube!) and there’s a lot of that as I’m often making some sort of improvement, upcycling a piece of furniture etc (it’s a bit of a hobby). I do get some shopping delivered but even then they bring it to the door and I then carry it up 2 flights of stairs to the kitchen. I go to gigs and dance, active holidays etc. So I think I do plenty. I’m not interested in formal exercise either.

People saying oh but I see my 90 year old relatives slowing down now. Well of course. They’re 90! No exercise mitigates age that much!

Get a couple of
cans out of your cupboard use them as dumbells in between chores, always take the stairs not the lift- you'll be fine.

Only one child but otherwise, you. We do just dance, with the small child. Walk the dog but fast. I need to do more but that's coming as she gets older and more independent (or when she goes to school and I have actual time).

Was thinking exactly this. I hate sport and exercise. I found PE at school utterly unbearable. As a teacher in secondary schools if any students wanted to skip sports day I used to let them!