Anyone who cares anything about their health has likely heard that you need to exercise at least a certain amount daily or weekly. For adults that number is 150 minutes per week of some form of moderate aerobic exercise or 75 minutes of more intense activity.
What about seniors? If you’re over 65, listen up.
In order to stay healthy, seniors need to keep moving as well, but they do catch a break on the amount of time they’re expected to exercise each week. Anyone over the age of 65 should be aiming for at least 2.5 hours of a moderate aerobic exercise each week. This would be something like walking or cycling. If you do that about 30 minutes every day, you’ll hit your goal.
But what if you’re still strong and healthy? Then you should at least try to do something a bit more vigorous. So if you’re still up for jogging, and can do that just 1.25 hours a week, that’s sufficient.
What about flexibility?
Like a machine that doesn’t get used and oiled properly, our bodies can seize up on as we age. Even those of us still younger need to keep our bodies in motion. But the aches and pains of old age might be helped with some simple stretching exercises.
Just don’t ever stop moving if you can help it.
FamilyDoctor.org has the following to say.
“Experts say seniors should aim to be as active as possible. If you are an older adult, exercise can help you live a longer, healthier life.”
We have a wonderful example in 102-year-old Julia Fulkerson.
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Nothing is getting this girl down!
Maybe it’s the incentive that her 6-year-old great-grandson gives her. Like many kids these days, young Brody Contreras is being schooled online. And during one of his physical education classes his grandmother decided she was going to join in.
And there is clearly nothing passive about this woman. Soon she was showing her family she still had the moves, and they were loving it.
WISNews reports that Brody’s mom, Angela Groch, said,
“I was cracking up and taking video after video, but it was also super surreal, just kind of watching.”
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The family hadn’t seen each other since the beginning of the pandemic, but as soon as Brody’s parents got vaccinated, they took a trip to see the family matriarch.
As Groch said,
“This was the first time that we’d been able to really spend some time with them because of the pandemic because we are able to be safe now.”
But a visit to see his great-grandmother didn’t allow Brody to skip school. And it was when his PE class started that Fulkerson suddenly joined in.
Groch shares some more detail in an interview with ABC15.
“I don’t think she realized it was school at that point. She just thought it was… you know. She doesn’t realize that they can see her and it’s interactive.”
And honestly, I get the feeling she wouldn’t care if you she did know.
Fulkerson’s daughter, Kim Contreras, has this to say about her mom.
“My mom is just a happy person. She’s always been that way. After her stroke, she could have been just a weepy person. Just watching her with him, it made me so happy.”
She’s 102, she’s had a stoke at some time in the past, but there is nothing holding her back. As AZFamily reports, young Brody says,
“Great-grandma was like dancing around and doing the PE exercise.”
Do you have a parent, grandparent, or great-grandparent you can motivate?
All of us should be moving as much as we can, but I’m sure it’s even harder for seniors, especially if it’s never been their habit.
Young Brody had Great-grandma Fulkerson doing some freestyling around the living room. Maybe your loved one would only be up to a stroll around the block, but at least it would be something.
Why not take the time while you still can with them and build some new connections? It would be beneficial on so many levels.
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