Exercise for obese 40 something

[Ohmywhat]

I am very overweight (morbidly obese) and would like to start some exercise. I need to be realistic though, so no suggestions of couch to 5k or boot camps please!

Just after some suggestions of gentle starts I can make in my home for now.

Thanks.

I would go for something like Get Fit With Rick:

https://www.youtube.com/@RickBhullarFitness

There's a mixture of stuff but all quite low impact.

I also like Walk At Home:

https://www.youtube.com/@LeslieSansonesWalkatHome

I prefer the videos where it's one person on their own, the ones with a whole group doing it are too whoopy and enthusiastic for my tastes!

I also like KaisaFit, she has a 'true beginners' course which is very gentle and a lot of is chair-based.

https://youtube.com/@yes2next

I like these two. I do them at lunchtime when I don't want to do anything too energetic but want to move a bit.

Would you swim, indoors or out? Very good for the mind and soul too, and minimal injury risk.

While you are brushing your teeth, stand on one leg to improve your balance.

Waiting for the kettle to boil, do some calf raises or squats.

Watching tv - March on the spot. Hold tins in each hand as weights.

Walking! Just start as you can and gradually increase the distance and pace

If you're starting from zero, just aim to do something every day this week.

You could do: walking up and down the stairs until you can't anymore

2x8 wall presses

30 minute walk

10 minutes yoga

Squatting every time you empty the washing machine.

You will feel amazing and it will start something amazing.

I started off with a goal just to do anything once a week. I'm now exercising to varying degrees every day. Some days it's just 2 x 10 min lunges/ squats, some days it's a full on hiit workout.

Thank you, some great tips here! I'm quite an early riser so my plan is just to do 'Something' each morning before work.

Sadly I can't swim (one of life's regrets) and I currently only do around 3000 steps a day so would like to up this, maybe add 1000 steps to my target at a time.

Walking is excellent, plus easy and cheap.

Just make sure you have comfortable shoes and start slowly and build up.

Be proud of yourself every day you do something, anything is better than nothing.

I would use grow with Jo on YouTube- they are walking based workouts. Anything from 1 mile To 5 miles so you can pick your length.

Is there an aqua aerobics class near you? I can highly recommend it.

I'm doing this OP. Go out, walk for 5 minutes, turn round and walk back again. Do this everyday for a week. On week 2 you do 10 minutes each way and on week 3 15 minutes. Would this work for you? I hate exercise, am very lazy and overweight but even I'm managing this as I'm trying to lose weight so know I need to get to grips with my lack of activity. Baby steps and all that. Good luck !

I’m not obese but dealing with a lot of injuries and I do Get Fit with Rick on YouTube as well. The workouts are all different lengths going from 1200 steps to 10000 steps and you can put as much into them as you want. The music is great and you can do multiple ones if you wanted, either one after each other or throughout the day. I have to be careful so if he does a move I can’t do then I do a random move. I have to keep fairly straight unfortunately.

I also do Yoga With Adriene on YouTube which I really enjoy for flexibility and my mental health rather than exercise.

Even if you can’t swim, have you thought about aqua fit/ aerobics. It burns loads of calories and is low impact. It might even spur you on to learn to swim.

There is so much free content on YouTube so just watch different workouts and see what you think and remember that walking or dancing workouts don’t need to be done perfectly. I swap things or mess up my steps but I keep going and apart from a super judgmental cat, no one is there to see me looking uncoordinated 😊

I’d say just walk. It’s the best form of exercise. If you have some kind of step counter, Fitbit or the like, try am beat your weekly best each week.
If you are quite sedentary, a half hour walk each day will make a huge difference.
Im not a lover of walking but I can make a big difference to my activity levels by leaving the car at home. It does boost your mood too.

I am obese too but probably a bit more active. Ordinarily I walk 10-12k steps a day. At the start of this year I started doing dance classes with Dance and Health (I pay for these). I am doing 30 minute classes every day. I started with the beginners classes but now do intermediate. I just find them fun and so I am not so conscious of exercising. I feel really positive that I can keep this up.

Just walk. Find a podcast you like and go for a mooch about. Doesn't have to be crazy power walking just aim to increase your movement.

We burn more calories through something called non exercise activity thermogenesis, this is aided by decisions like taking the stairs not the lift and parking further away from the supermarket! All these miniscule things add up over a week and make a huge difference.

I have 4 friends with dogs so have started joining them on walks, although one friend didn’t realise how completely unfit I am & nearly killed me! I’m very overweight with back/glutes problems & an umbilical hernia so wanted to keep it simple.