I understand that everything can feel helpless when you have reached that level of obesity. I am sure that you have tried many diets in the past only to lose a little weight and then gain it all back. If you haven’t read my article on the benefits of strength, then I suggest you look there to understand how to get sustainable weight loss. There are things you shouldn’t do if you are obese or morbidly obese.
Obesity is a category where you are likely 100+ pounds overweight. All that extra weight is a heavy burden on your entire body especially if you are older. You probably already know that there are several exercises that you can’t do. The less obvious exercises that you should avoid if you are an older obese person are:
- Most bodyweight or calisthenic type exercises
- High impact and rapid movements
- Long walks
Bodyweight exercises
It is no secret that you are carrying a lot of extra weight. This places a tremendous amount of stress on your joints. So, when you are trying to perform certain body weight exercises you may be doing more damage than good. If a trainer tries to tell you to do some of these you should tell them “Thank you for your time, but I’d like to try a different trainer”.
Push-ups – Trying to do push ups as an elderly obese would put a lot of stress on your shoulders. Not to mention, if you haven’t done a push up in decades, to suddenly drop down and try to do even just one is insane. You will have a high probability of injuring your shoulders, elbows, and back from trying to attempt this exercise.
Safer Alternative – Try using a band, machine, or cable for a chest press. This will allow you to get a good chest workout without the added stress on you shoulders and other parts of your body. You could try an elevated push up such as a wall or counter. However, you must be able to go the full range without pain, and under good control. If you are in a gym the smith machine is a great tool for push-ups.
Squats and lunges – These two exercises carry a similar risk to push-ups. Your legs are under enough stress carrying your body weight around. I am sure that prior to starting anything you are already dealing with some chronic knee pain. We are not going to put untrained joints under that pressure of lifting your body, especially with a single leg like the lunge. Your center of balance is already slightly in front of you, and you don’t have the proper movement pattern to do the exercises.
Safer Alternative – Instead of blowing out your knees and hips let’s try to work your legs a different way. This is when I would recommend a leg press machine for building strength. This way you will have more control over the exercise and be able to progressively overload as you get stronger. I would also recommend yoga like poses for balancing. Balancing your body in a staggered stance is ridiculously more challenging than it sounds. Just working on being able to stay there for any length of time will likely get you sweating a burning up a storm. Sit to stands can also be another safer but functional alternative building legs. You can make the exercise a little easier by stacking books so that you can stand from a slightly higher position. Then take away books as you get stronger.
Build strength safely
You can build strength through resistance training; you just need to do it safely. As an elderly obese person, you are more prone to injury, and injuries will only set you back farther. Machine or cable like exercises are the best way to go to safely build strength in an upright position
High impact and rapid movements
This is most likely and obvious category, but I must put this in here. I guarantee that some of you reading this that are obese have some sort of athletic or military background. This most often translates to the idea that you can do far more than you can handle. “Push through the pain, I have to push through to get better” is always the mindset of people with this background. I have trained several people with this mindset and must constantly remind them to stop and slow down.
Group fitness classes and burpees
Group fitness classes are definitely a fun and encouraging entrance into the gym space. The classes are fun with good music, and the people in there are all super encouraging. However, most classes are too fast with too many multidirectional athletic exercises. This goes back to the blown-out knees portion of this article. If you were to take your weight and move sideways just to land on one foot. Think about the amount of stress that you would be putting on that knee.
We often get caught up in the idea that we need to keep up with the rest of the class. If we try to do something that is outside the scope of our abilities, we run the risk of getting hurt. Trying to do things to hard too quickly will lead to burn out and injuries. Unfortunately, sometimes this is the culture of group fitness classes.
Safer alternative
You can probably do a slower paced group class that allows you to move at your own pace or individualizes the exercises to your own abilities. There are group classes that incorporate a chair so that you do not have to get down on the ground. For example, chair yoga is a class I would highly recommend to anyone that is sedentary and has difficulty with getting up from the ground. You will get more flexibility and a light workout on your core.
Another alternative would be to find a small group strength training class. I teach a class like this and the size of the group allows me to check everyone’s form and help with any questions on any of the movements. I am also able to individualize that workout to each person. I have a general workout available to everyone, but I provide modifiers to anyone who isn’t fit for a particular exercise.
Long Walks
Most people would probably assume that any type of walking will be good for you. And you would be right to a certain extent. Please walk regularly and everyday if at all possible. Walking is definitely the best cardio for anyone and is one of the keys to losing weight. However, long walks can be risky if you are in the obese category.
I would define a long walk as anything over a mile, or outside of your comfort zone. What is the problem with long walks? Your chances of injury will go up significantly if you start walking long distances. Walking by itself is a complicated movement. Your body has to move in a perfect synchronized order to walk. If anything is off starting from your toes all the way up to the swing in your arms, you may develop overuse injuries. With short walks you may not notice anything, but as you start to get tired these habits will become much more apparent. Don’t forget to add in outside variables. Uneven surfaces, inclines, and declines can create tripping hazards and back issues from leaning.
Safer alternative
Short bouts of walking on primarily a flatter surface will be a safer alternative. Short distances that you can easily tolerate and allowing your self to rest before beginning another round will be safer overall. This way you can focus on your gait and how your body feels with each step instead of forcing yourself to go a certain distance. Some suggestions may be a treadmill or laps around a basketball court or tennis court.
If you plan on doing your walking within your home then I suggest doing it barefoot. Shoes are rather confining and majority do not fit the way our feet are made. The toe box is typically far too narrow. Remember that your feet are the first part to touch the ground and the one part that we depend most heavily on. By walking barefoot you can increase their strength and their ability to spread and grip the ground which will allow for better balance.
Focus on muscle connection, mobility, and awareness
You need to treat your body like you are an athlete in the middle of their season. These professionals are assessing, reassessing, and doing everything they can to prevent injuries. You may not be able to do a lot of things safely now, but they are goals for you to reach for. By starting with modified exercises you can begin to build the mind muscle connection. By also adding in corrective exercises to increase your mobility you will build more body awareness. Working on these in conjunction with safely building muscle and increasing your cardio will accelerate your growth. This way you will be able to continuously workout and work on your goals without getting injured. Results may be slower, but they will be steady and safer.
