Debra Jager Home Instead Senior Care

Popular activities that incorporate movement are often the best way to keep seniors active.

To stay independent and enjoy the quality of life that we all want as we age, we need to do some activity. Because if we don't, our muscles will atrophy and our bodies will deteriorate sooner. Seniors' health issues often are not with ageing, but rather with disuse.

According to statistics, more than 60 per cent of older adults are inactive. Fear of exercise can keep seniors with arthritis and other aches and pains from leading the active lifestyles they may have enjoyed in their younger years. But mention activities such as lively conversation, a good television programme, a brisk walk on a nice day, and your elderly loved one is likely to perk right up. Incorporating movements into those popular senior pastimes, oftentimes with the assistance of a family or professional caregiver or companion, is one way to keep seniors young and vital well into their elderly years.

The main benefit of activity for people who are ageing is actually reversing the impact that disuse has on their bodies.

Here are some practical ways that caregivers can recommend that seniors incorporate activity into their lives. For the true TV couch potatoes who use two remotes, suggest they stand up, move around and walk in place whenever a commercial comes on. That's a start. Recommend they walk to the store or park in the back of the parking lot. There are a lot of basic ways to build activity into the day, get up and down in your chair slowly 10 times in a row, four times a day.

There are a number of over-50s exercise classes in the Bay of Plenty. Body and Soul, Recycled Teenagers, The Heart Foundation and YMCA all run appropriate classes. They are non-intimating and add a social element as well. Pick up the phone today to find out more. You will be amazed how just a little exercise can change both your outlook on life and physical wellbeing. Our bodies were built to move, not moving is the unnatural thing. And that's true at any age.