At sixty-four years old, Geoff tipped the scale at 305 pounds. This caused diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure, and a whole list of other health problems, all treated with medication. At a lecture he heard me say there were very few 300-pound eighty-year-olds walking around, and almost no 300-pound ninety-year-olds. Sheepishly he asked if I could help him. I said yes, but only if he did everything I told him to do (knowing that most people eat half as well and exercise half as much as I recommend). Geoff did everything. Prior to getting on The Blood Sugar Solution, his main sport was binge eating. Slowly he built up to 45 minutes of aerobic exercise a day, 30 minutes of strength training 3 times a week, and 15 minutes of stretching a day. A year later he came back 140 pounds lighter, and free of diabetes, heart disease, and medication.
Exercise is probably the most powerful medicine for treating diabesity and other diseases. It is a one-stop-shopping miracle potion. It would save more lives than all the antibiotics and vaccines combined. If it were a prescription medication, we could all buy stock and retire tomorrow. Scientists refer to exercise as a “polypill” because it treats everything.1
Here are some of its benefits. Exercise:
Recent research in the Journal of the American Medical Association4 found that combining aerobic conditioning (getting your heart rate going for a sustained period) and strength training (building muscle) has the most benefit for diabesity and weight loss.
Ideally you should do a minimum of 30 minutes of walking every day. Get a pedometer to track your steps. Wear it every day and set a goal of 10,000 steps a day. See www.bloodsugarsolution.com/fitbit to buy a great step tracker.
More vigorous and sustained exercise is often needed to reverse severe diabesity. Run, bike, dance, play games, jump on a trampoline, or do whatever is fun for you. Sustained aerobic exercise, during which you reach 70–85 percent of your maximum heart rate (see below for how to calculate) for up to 60 minutes, 5–6 times a week is often necessary for getting diabesity under full control. A little is good; more is better. Start with 5 minutes a day and work up. All you need is a pair of sneakers.
Studies have found you can boost your metabolism, burn more calories all day long, and lose more weight by exercising for less time. Interval training—shorter sessions with short speed bursts, or what we call “wind sprints”—is a simple way to supercharge your routine. The key is going anaerobic (meaning your cells switch to burning calories without oxygen for brief periods) and going above your target heart rate for short bursts.
Substituting 30 minutes of interval training 2–3 days a week for your regular aerobic exercise routine can give you more benefits in less time. An example of an interval training regimen might be:
I’ve come across a powerful interval-training program that many of my readers have used with incredible success. Go to www.bloodsugarsolution.com/pace to find out more.
Strength training is also important because it helps maintain and build muscle, which can help with your overall blood sugar and energy metabolism. One of the biggest factors in aging and diabesity is muscle loss. The technical word for this is sarcopenia. Muscle is where you burn the most calories. If your muscle is flabby and marbled with fat, you become insulin resistant and age faster.
You can build muscle in all sorts of ways—using everything from dumbbells to exercise bands, medicine balls, exercise machines, even your own body weight through martial arts, yoga, or Pilates. Personally I like yoga because I get three in one—strength, stretching, and relaxation. If you do “hot” yoga, you get a sauna and detox, too! You may need help getting started or learning a routine, but make it your own and do it three times a week.
Keeping flexible with stretching or yoga prevents injury and pain from other types of activity. With some kinds of yoga, you can even achieve aerobic exercise, strength training, and stretching all in one workout. Try to get in at least 5 minutes of stretching before and after exercise routines, and do 30–60 minutes of whole-body stretching twice a week.
As a basic minimum, commit to 30 minutes of vigorous walking every day while you are on this program. More is better, and for some of you, increasing your aerobic exercise over time is particularly important. Start by walking every day. Then, if you want or need a more comprehensive exercise regimen (which I strongly encourage), follow these guidelines:
For more detailed instructions, suggestions, and resources for how to incorporate exercise into your life and build a routine that works for you, please see www.bloodsugarsolution.com. There are many great programs, ideas, and ways to get moving. But just get moving!
I have a confession to make. I hate to exercise. Play, absolutely, but exercise, ugh. You will almost never find me in the gym.
I do many different things that keep me fit, and I encourage you to explore all the things you enjoy and save traditional exercise for those times when you just can’t find a way to play.
Here are my favorite ways to play:
What are your excuses for not exercising?
Are these excuses based in reality, or is there something you can do about them? More often than not, there is something else going on—lack of motivation, negative associations, or low self-esteem. Inertia is hard to overcome, and there may be some initial painful feelings and beliefs, but once you start, you will wonder why you ever resisted it.