WVU Community Health Forum - Exercise and the Holidays

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
The WVU Medicine Community Health Forum presentedby WVU Medicine Camden Clark Medical Center.
Listen every Sunday morning from seven thirtyto eight am, or check out the
podcast on the iHeartRadio app or whereveryou get your podcasts. Good morning,
MV. We are back with theCommunity Health Forum presented by WVU Medicine,

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Camden Clark Medical Center. I'm ScottHessen in the studio today with the one
and only Louis here. Welcome,Louis. Great to be here. I
tell you what, Louis. Itis that time of year, the holidays
have rolled around, and you knowour topic today is going to be exercise
and the holidays. And tell us, Louis, why it'd be a good
time now to start thinking about that. I think, you know, the

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majority of folks out there are thinking, all right, the end of the
year's coming and what's coming next Januaryfirst, twenty twenty four, and they
start, you know, looking atthemselves or thinking about just health in general,
and oh what, you know,I'm going to start working out next
year. But I think a goodthing to do for folks is maybe especially
because it seems like there's more familyaround different things going on in our community

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or where you might be. Isa good time to really kind of start
thinking about it now. Don't waittill January to get into it now.
Most folks wait till the New Year'sresolution stage, and you don't have to
do that. Go ahead and getstarted. What would be some of the
benefits to start your exercise routine alittle bit early before the holidays. I
think, especially in the gym settingor in the health and wellness center setting,

(01:29):
is that you might beat the crowds. One of the biggest reasons folks
do not come to gym's is justthe fear of never being there or I'm
not going to fit in. Soit's like, you know, if you
can come in now, we're alittle bit slower. Obviously, people are
getting ready for the holidays and doingthings. So it's just the crowds are
a lot smaller now than they wouldbe if you wait the first year,
because as you said, everybody's goingto come in that and start. So

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I think getting a little jump onit now and you may not go into
a full blown workout, but it'sjust start thinking about start doing something,
just walking, doing something little.So I think it's just it's a good
time to get started now ahead ofeveryone else. Get a jump start.
Yeah, other than just the basicaround the house exercises, what are some
steps folks could implement to get theirexercise routine going in a positive direction before

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the holiday? Yeah, I think, you know, little things that people
don't think about this, But becauseyou watch when you go to Walmart or
you go to the mall, everybody'strying to park close to the building.
You'll just little mindset things like thatare to park as far away as you
possibly can save your car getting dingtoo. But yeah, multi fascinating,
yes exactly, but park further awayfrom the stores you're going to and walk

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in and walk back, get upand start taking them Just a little walk
around your neighborhood, you know,take your dog on a walk as family
and friends start to come in.So, hey, guys, after dinner,
we're all gonna take a little walk. You know, we're gonna go.
There's a lot of nice towns aroundhere. Marriette is beautiful to walk
around downtown, Downtown Parkersburg. Wegot a lot of walking paths. So

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there's little things you can do nowjust to kind of and it seems like,
you know, in our industry,we see more guests come in,
so there's more people off work rightnow, so you have more time to
go start doing things like that.So right, I love the idea of
parking as far away from Walmart asyou can because that does it creates a
little bit of exercise, whether youlike it or not. Yeah, you

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know, some folks may have medicalissues. Is it important to see a
physician before you start a workout routine? Yeah, it certainly is, especially
if you're going to get into ayou know, full fledged workout where you're
going to start doing you know,steady cardio, lifting, weights, selectorized
machines, aerobic classes, whatever thatmay be. If you're the person that
has never done anything or is justgoing to start right now, it is

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a great idea to at least contacta physician. You may not need to
have an office visit if you've hadone, but to call them and say,
hey, I'm going to start aworkout routine. Are there any limitations
or anything I should not do orwatch out for when I start? Is
a real good idea to do that, right, That's a great idea.
You know, some folks may berehaving an injury or or like me,
I was in pretty good shape atone time. I wrestled, I played

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basketball, baseball, but then letthe belly come on, and you know,
now is probably a good time forme to start getting back into the
exercise before I let it go toofar, right, you know, I
guess it's probably real important to setgoals for yourself when you do get started
with an exercise program. Yeah,and that's something you know this time of
year, especially short you know,set some short term girls goals, like

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you said in your family comes justtell them right away, say hey,
guys, we're gonna open presence,We're gonna do whatever. We're gonna surround
eat turkey all day with tomorrow,but we're all gonna go out and take
a walk. We're gonna do certainthings and put those goals somewhere. Just
basic goals, like I'm gonna workout twice a week. I've never doing
nothing. You go from nothing totwo or three days a week. Just
doing something is a good thing.Put those goals, whatever they may be,

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somewhere. You're gonna see them everyday, whether it's your mirror and
your bathroom, the refrigerator, that'sa great place everybody's going to, especially
these times, but put through somewhereyou're going to see them every day,
so it's, you know, frontof your mind all the time that hey,
I made a commitment to start exercising, and these are my and don't
make a lot of them, makeone or two and one of them makes
just too hard, exactly, justdo something and make that one of your

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main goals. And then probably thesecond goal that I would tell everybody,
regardless of what your goals are,be consistent, right, whatever that goal
is, stick to it. Andthat builds a good habit. If you
can do one or two things fora while, then you can build on
that as you move forward. Soyou set these goals and you do your
best to try to stick to them. Is it okay every now and then

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to maybe break one of the goalsor maybe sidestep the game plan? Yeah?
And I think that's key, especiallythis time of year, for those
that have not, you know,been working out, or someone that works
out all the time, it's easierto say, all right, may have
an extra piece of pie, orI'm gonna not eat quite as clean,
or I might take a day offfrom my workout. And that's that's one

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of the advantages of being assistant withyour exercise and having a program that you're
consistently doing. You're seeing gains.You go to your physician for your checkups.
Blood pressure is good, blood worksgood, just those preventative type things
that allows you to say, youknow what, you know, I just
I'm kind of over the top withit. But mentally you can say,
right, I can take a dayoff and relax. So yeah, I

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don't think you know, taking aday off here there is bad. Now,
if you're someone that hasn't been doinganything and you're going to just kill
the food, that's a little different. Right. Yeah, what you're saying
is work toward that goal. Butyeah, Thanksgiving and Christmas, those are
times where you may want to justgo ahead and step off the game plant.

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But like you said, if youput in the groundwork to get yourself
started back into getting into shape,then a cheat day here and there's probably
not too bad, especially around theholidays. Right, And like I said,
you've you've been an athlete, soyou understand that. I mean,
you know what you went through whenyou were playing and tiptop shape and it's
like all right, well, Ican probably eat you know, bowl ice
career, so it's not gonna affectme too much. In a wrestling season

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is probably a little different. You'recutting weight and have to be there,
but you know what it takes toget there, and that's where people need
to get. They need to eitherget back to something they used to be
or start and then say, youknow what, all right, I'm feeling
better because you will see results justthrough overall health will get a lot better.
Right and you know you said earlier, everybody has to set their own

(07:25):
goals up. How often should folksbe hitting the gym? How often should
they be exercising? That depends onthe person. You know, there's a
lot of statistics out there that there'sonly a small portion of our population that
meets the minimum requirements for cardiovascu therein weight training and that type thing.
What we'd like to tell folks isbasically do what works for you. You

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know, people always say what's thebest time of day? How much should
I do? That depends on theperson. Every single person has a different
range of an amount of things theywant to do. Some folks like to
do their cardiovascer work out in themornings and do their weights in the afternoon.
They some of like people just doit after work and just you know,
when I'm done, I'm gonna gowork out and then I'm I'm set.

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So the amount just depends on theperson what you're looking to do.
You know, runner is going todo mostly running. Guys that are big
and bulky and bodybuilding or powerlifting,they're probably not gonna do a ton of
cardioascod work. So it just dependson what it is. What your goals
are kind of determines what your workoutkind of like the intensity, level,
time, that type thing, right, And I guess probably the the the

(08:33):
shape you're in depends a lot onhow often your exercise as well. You
know, somebody's just trying to gettoned or back into shape probably isn't going
to have as much work involved assomebody who has let themselves go in or
back into gym for the first timein quite at right. And that's the
other thing too. I mean,if you've not been doing something, you
know, I would tell you,don't set lofty goals. Don't come into

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a facility or start on your ownwhatever it is and think, Okay,
I'm gonna go from zero to ahundred like that. It's taking a long
time to get you in the shapewhere you're probably not happy with yourself now,
so it's going to take time toget you back. So I would
not get discouraged, and I wouldtell people whatever they set their goals of,
however long they do it, besmart about it and be realistic.

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You know, look in the mirror, say what I have not done anything
for not going to go back outhere and just jump right in one hundred
percent and go with this guys hereevery day of the week. Yeah,
if you haven't haven't run in awhile, don't jump into a five ki
for exactly, walk it or somethingnice like that. So I guess it's
important to know your limitations when yougo into the gym and have someone help

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you set those limitations if you reallydon't know what they are yourself, right,
you know, they're going to thephysician. That is that first step,
finding out making sure your blood personin good shape, blood work,
and there if you you know,they may tell you've got some limitations if
you're on just for example, thatthere's a lot of people out there in
beta blockers. It doesn't allow theheart to go as fast as it should.
Regulate your heart right basically, andyou need to know that because if

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you get on a bike and youtell someone that you're just looking, oh,
my heart rate's not going up.But you know, another simple test
would be a talk test. Ifyou and I can talk like this,
you could probably work a little bitharder. If we're talking and you're really
trying to suck air to talk,might want to back off a little bit.
So there's little tricks like that.But yeah, it's knowing your limitations
again. You know the younger guysthat come you go into a gym and

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they write to the freeway room andthey're trying to throw, you know,
three hundred pounds on a bench pressand things like that, that's probably not
always the smartest thing to do.Know your limitations your yeah, exactly.
And you know, exercise is goodfor so many things. You know,
obviously it's good for your heart,it's good for your body in general,
but you can get your mind rightexercising as well. And you know,

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I've read studies and surveys that sayit's really good for anxiety as well.
If somebody has anxiety, just gettingaway from it all and kind of putting
yourself into the exercise routine sometimes canquell a little bit of that anxiety.
Oh for sure. They're like yousaid, there's a ton of studies out
there and what exercise does for anxiety. And it seems like here in the

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last five to six years, Imean, anxiety has it's almost one of
those I would say mental illness.With just an illness that some folks have.
They really get uptight and social anxietyand things like that. So exercise
can really help it. I meanthere's there's folks taking mental days off and
things like that. So but exercisetruly does help that, you know,

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I will tell I mean that's forme. It's kind of like if I
don't do my exercise, I mayget a little amped up. I get
just a little edgier with everybody.It's like it's it's almost like, you
know, that's what I tell people, So how do you do do that
so much? And I said,it's like I said, do you brush
your teeth? Well, yeah,that's what you have to do is you
have to make exercise a part ofyour day and make it a part of

(11:52):
your lifestyle. And that's just andI think you get to that point,
like we talked about earlier, thenyou can you know, cheat once in
a while, isle and and takebreak once in the whiles, right and
getting back around to that, theholidays are coming, It's okay to cheat
during the holidays as long as you'rekeeping true to your routine and your exercise
schedule. I don't really call thatcheat right Christmas dinner at my mama's house.

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I mean, you're eating exactly,and I would encourage people to do,
and I really do, and Idon't. I just are saying it
has been for many years, isexercises medicine, and I truly believe that
because there's not really an illness outhere, especially when you look at our
area and just West Virginia in general. You know, what are some of
the top things we deal with here? Heart attack, diabetes. Guess what.

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Exercise can benefit both of those diseasesand really help even on the preventative
side or once you've had it,be able to get you to back,
you know, back to where anybecause every cardiologist is going to tell you,
every diabetic doc is going to tellyou you need to exercise and need
to eat right and just basically havean overall good lifestyle, so yeah,
and build yourself back into a betterquality of life through that. And yeah,

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like I said, I'm on aexercise routine now, but I'm going
to munch down Christmas time. It'sjust kind of yeah. So how would
an individual go about starting a newprogram or what are some things you can
do with your family during the holidaysif you're all gathered around, you don't
really have the time to go intoa gym over the holidays and you want

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to do something just maybe around thehouse and include the family with I mean,
there's some really neat things out therefrom a technology standpoint, I mean
there are these different video games youcan put on the family can do exercise,
or teams together play ITV fail youknow, all that kind of stuff
is it's fun to do. Youknow. Locally, there's a couple of
races. The Turkey trot has beenaround for a long long time. I

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think that's something you know, youcan either walk that, you can jog
it. You know, the wholefamily can do that. It's just a
fun time to do before you eatand get out and do it. One
of the things I would say,if you decide to do something like that.
We talk about limitations and being prepared. Is you know, if you're
gonna go do the turkey trot likewe spoke about earlier, and you haven't
done anything, make sure you havea good pair of shoes, and again,

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know your limitations. If you've notbeen running, it's probably smart to
maybe walk most of their jog alittle bit and then back off. But
that's something you can take the wholefamily with. You can dress up,
put turkey hats on, and justsomething that's fun is still doing you some
some good. So I think goingout in the backyard, toss football around
with the kids, you know,run around, just walk in your neighborhood,

(14:28):
take the dog for a walk.I mean, like I said,
there's so many things. And thenthe trails around here again are beautiful that
the want along Marietta along the river'snice. Partersburg has some nice walking trails,
So there's there's really no excuse forsomeone to say, oh, the
gyms aren't open today, or there'splenty of things you can do right well.
My daughter is in from New Orleansfor the holidays. What we've been

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doing is just kind of walking theold neighborhood that she grew up in.
She has she went away to collegeat LSU and STA New Orleans, so
she hasn't lived been that neighborhood inten years. So we've just been kind
of walking by and you know,seeing how the old neighborhood has transformed into
the neighborhood. Empty lots that usedto be there now have two houses on

(15:11):
them, and so yeah, it'sa lot of fun. I think that
is a great idea when the familycomes in for the holidays, just kind
of take a walk, ye,enjoy your neighborhood, gets you out of
the house, gets you a littlefresh air, and and everybody's worried about
you know, people getting sick inthe winter and things like that. Again,
exercise can help boost your immune system. So especially in the fall,
even if it's not the holidays,it's a great time to start exercising to

(15:37):
you know. Even with you know, the big scare with COVID we had
for a long time, there weremultiple studies. I know, we don't
know a ton about that yet,but there's still you know, different sides
of it. But just about everyarticle that we read there is a consistent
theme that those of you that arein shape your immune system stronger, and
if you did get it, yourrecovery pire was a lot you know,
I went a lot smoother for you. So there's many Like we said,

(16:00):
there's just a ton of benefits toexercise. Yeah, and having your body
prepared for some kind of an illnesslike you said, like COVID or the
flu comes in. If you're inbetter shape, your body's better prepared to
fight those viruses and things off well. So as we come to the end
of twenty twenty three, Louis,is is it too early to start thinking
about your twenty twenty four goals?Or when should you start looking toward next

(16:23):
year? Now? I seriously Iwould start thinking now. I mean they
said, you've got a lot ofdowntime from work, just to look at
your whole work life balance. Thisis a good time to do it.
You know, everything is so fastnow, I mean even here. I'm
not from this area originally, I'vebeen here a good while now, but
my mom lives somewhere different where it'sa lot more laid back, And I

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think I just think the world's gottentoo quick personally, is my thought.
I think we all need to slowdown and take some time for ourselves,
and it's just a good time tokind of sit down, get a piece
of paper out, and just kindof write down five or six little things
there on. It don't have totake all of those and then kind of
narrow them down to your top threeand say, all right, I'm accomplished

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this this year. And it doesn'thave to all be about exercise. It's
about managing your stress, which exercisewill help too. But come up with
two or three goals just from yourwhole life perspective. Am I going to
eat better? You know? AmI gonna start exercising? Am I not
gonna let work rule my life?And make sure I'm spending appropriate amount of
time with my family? Right?Keeping God in your life everything everything.
Just have a balance of life,I think is the key for all of

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us, because it just seems like, you know, I look around,
you talk to somebody. Hell work, work, work, work, work.
You know there's you know, youstay at work longer. Guess who
suffers your family, your friends,things like that. Oh, I can't
do that tonight because we gotta Igotta go back to work or whatever it
is. I think, you know, we all need to do a better
job of that, and I thinkstarting now, it's not even December,
we got plenty of time. Startthinking about it, get them down on

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paper, and then again, beconsistent with what you choose. Yeah,
dedicate your time and your effort inthe right place and you should time for
everything exactly the right way. Sodo you have any tips or any anything
that can help folks when they whenthey go to exercise? What what makes
it easier? So I know youwere saying a lot of times folks have

(18:12):
anxiety of going into a gym ifthey're they're not comfortable, if they're not
gym rats like I have been inthe past, And what would what would
you suggest to folks that are tryingto get back in it but not really
comfortable about it. I mean,if they're worried about you know, with
people going to think, maybe startsomething outside the gym at your house,
Like I said, get get alittle program started, get a little base

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built up. But I think thenext thing is just go take a tour
of the facility you're thinking about lookingat, get a comfort level for and
get a feeling for what type ofa group of people are in this facility
at this time of day. Andmost places will tell you you come into
ours, so we can tell youwhen the business part of the day is
this age groups here. This partof the day, this age group's a

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little different, you know, afterworks a little bit younger, the mornings
are older, crowd are you know, things like that. So I think
that's one of the things you cando is tour the facility and just for
yourself, get your eyes on whattype of folks are there and what they're
doing at that time. So doyou think, Louis, that it would
be a good idea to get apartner to exercise with. Is that help
going back and forth with someone?Yeah, for sure. I mean if

(19:18):
you and I were work out partnersand you know, we've got to be
there at seven o'clock in the morning, and I got it's five after seven,
you're not there, I'm probably becalling you and say, hey,
buddy, where are you in thatlittle motivation, little motivation, and it
kind of helps you push each other. You set goals and lean on each
other to go. If you're downa little bit, man, let's go,
let's pick it up. I comein tomorrow. I'm you know,
dragging a little bit. You pushthe other things you know when you mentioned

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earlier about you know, these wearables. There's a lot of these watches out
there. And again I'm not realtech savvy, but I have grabbed my
wife's a few times, and look, because I am OCD about my distance
when I run, or how farI bake or how long I'm doing my
exercise. They can track just abouteverything out You can have your heart rate,
your blood pressure, your distance thatyou've gone, and a lot of

(20:00):
them have the GPS. So that'sreally nice. We were talking earlier in
one of my son's moved to Columbusup in the Polaris area, and Chase
Morgan has a huge complex up therewith a beautiful walking track and I took
off but I didn't know it,but I'm like, all right, I
took her watch by gully. Youknow, I was about down at five
miles all right, time to quit. So that kind of thing, and
you can set goals with those.I mean, everybody says ten thousand steps

(20:22):
today. Those things track that,So that's a nice you know, a
nice thing to have things like thatI think can help you kind of get
get started and set small goals.Like I said, there's a quick one
ten thousand steps. You don't realizehow many steps you take in today and
how ten thousands not that hard toget to. But it's a nice starting
short term Golder. If you've gotan active lifestyle, ten thousand steps a

(20:45):
whole lot. Well, let meask you this as we wrap things up
here today on the podcast, canyou highlight some of the programs that you
have at the Health and Wellness Centerand let people know how they can get
started. Sure. Like I said, probably the easiest way is to come
down and take a free tool facilityanytime asked for Scott Smith. He is
our sales coordinator and does a greatjob of the tour and give you all
the information you need. And againI think that's very important to you get

(21:08):
eyes on. You can go toour web page and look at what we
have, but it's just so muchnicer to come into the facility and actually
see it. But we have kindof moved our model around several years ago,
and I think most folks in thearea know that. But we are
medically integrated, medically based fitness center, and I think that's key, especially
in our area. We've got somenice programs that are actually when I say

(21:29):
integrated, tied end with things thatgo on at the hospital. For example,
you have a heart attack, probablygoing to be in the hospital,
whatever catherization, whatever happens, Phaseone and phase two at the hospital.
Maintenance phase or what used to becalled phase three is at our facility.
We've got cardiac and respiratory maintenance phase. At our facility. We have the
areas of Regions only Cancer Exercise programand that has been phenomenal. Everybody's went

(21:55):
through that program. That's for folksthat just found out you had cancer.
You're going through through it. Andagain that's integrated with the hospital. You
go to our web page and youlook at our Fit to Thrive Cancer Exercise
per them and you click the button. You're going to see all the cancer
docs at W Madison Canon Clark andget information on them. So and that
integration is key because if something happens, guess what, you go right back

(22:18):
down to Canon Clark and they knowexactly what's going on with what you've been
doing at the Health and Wellness center. Other programs that people may be asking
about, like Strong for surgery,if you're going to go have surgery,
getting ready, get your body ready, and then after you can come back.
We fit for arthoughtics. We've gotgroup exercise classes obviously, the free
weights and selectrized machines and Cardiovascu basketballvolleyball. I mean, it's a multi

(22:41):
purpose facility and probably everyone's number onelove is our or is our pool,
absolutely so everybody was my favorite.We got about twenty six hundred visits a
month just to our pool a loanso's it's a busy place, so a
little bit of everything for everyone,all ages. So just i'd encourage you
to stop by and take a look, and especially for December, we've got
a special going on. It's onlytwenty three bucks or initiation fees. It's

(23:03):
the end of twenty twenty three,right, so that's our special for December.
So we'd love to see you comein and take a look around.
Well, we sure appreciate you beinghere on the show with us today,
Louis, and I guess we'll seeyou again a couple of weeks with another
episode. Yes, sir, andwe appreciate you. That a WVU Community
Health Forum presented by WVU Medicine,Camden Clark. You can check out the
podcast on iHeartRadio or anywhere else youget podcast. We'll see you again in

(23:27):
a couple of weeks. Thanks Louis, thank you.