General Health

Exercise for Diabetes Control

Diabetes, the most common and most fatal disease results in 80,000 deaths annually in the U.S, itself. When left undiagnosed, results can be catastrophically ranging from symptoms like fatigue, increased thirst to blurred vision and numbness/pain in the body.

The best remedies for diabetes include doing diabetes exercise and maintaining a healthy diet. Maintaining the level of sugar intake in the diet and a controlled lifestyle can keep diabetes at bay.

Since diabetes is actually due to the increase of sugar levels in the body, working out and sweating, walking or jogging, and regular exercise can help you control the symptoms to a great extent.

[Also Read: Natural Remedies To Control Diabetes]

Why Exercise for Diabetes?

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Physical activities and exercises are generally underestimated and we turn a blind eye to their benefits. However, they are known to be highly advantageous in controlling several symptoms and also help in the prevention of a few others.

Exercises include movement of body parts that increases energy usage and also improves blood glucose control in type 2 diabetes. Additionally,  it is also noted that structured exercise reduces cardiovascular risk factors and benefits in weight loss.

Regular diabetes exercise plan may prevent or delay type 2 diabetes(1) significantly. Regular exercise also has some vital health benefits for people with type 1 diabetes. Physical activity and exercise recommendations should be tailored to meet the specific needs of each individual.

[Read: Yoga Poses to Control Diabetes]

Benefits of Exercise For Diabetes

Exercises for diabetes can be really beneficial for anybody. Since moderate exercise does not have any side-effect, they can be incorporated in daily life by a healthy individual as well as a patient.

However, if you are suffering from diabetes, the best way to improve your situation is by exercising regularly. You can endorse yourself for a particular exercise say:

  1. Walking or jogging for shorter distances and then increasing the distance exponentially.
  2. Cycling can be a good option to keep leg joints functional.
  3. Additionally, you could also try dancing as it can help you maintain body balance and keeping your muscles all functional.

Alternatively, one could also try

  • Gardening
  • Water aerobics
  • Swimming
  • Normal work-out and exercises

These can be some of the other forms of physical activities you can take a shot at. Along with these, you can also increase the physical activity of your body in everyday life by making small changes such as taking stairs instead of the lift, cleaning around the house yourself, doing laundry.

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[Read: Tips to Reverse Diabetes Naturally]

Exercise and Diabetes: How to manage?

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Most of the diabetic patients face the issue that they are not able to endorse or keep up with the physical activity they are suggested.

The tiredness or dizziness or the pain disables them from continuing the exercise.

In any such case, the best way out is to start with a little. So for the first week, you can start by walking to say half a  kilometer or one and then with every week increase it to the next half.

If you are doing any other activity, start the first day with 5 minutes, then with each week uplift the time limit. This way you can reach and create new milestones and increase your sweating, diminishing sucrose(2) levels helping in your diabetic condition.

[Read: Home Remedies for Diabetes Mellitus]

Do’s and Don’ts for Diabetes Exercise

  • Commit to your exercise and dedicate minimum 150 minutes a week to it.
  • Keep a continuous check on your blood glucose level.
  • While walking and jogging, wear comfortable and good shoes.
  • Avoid getting any cuts or wounds.
  • Never exercise when you are empty stomach.
  • If you feel any pain, never ignore it. Consult a specialist in every case.
  • Don’t indulge in any prolonged or hard exercise.
  • Whatever you commit to, perform daily in a routine.
  • Always drink lots of water.
  • Breakdown your exercise time in small intervals of say 10 minutes and do them at least twice a day.

FAQs

1. How Does Exercise Help Diabetes?

Ans: Exercise can help your insulin to work better, efficiently and it can also help control your blood glucose level. Regular training helps in elevating muscle capillary density, lipid metabolism, and insulin signaling proteins. These, in turn, result in improvements in your diabetic conditions.

2. Is Exercise Beneficial in All Cases of Diabetes?

Ans: In most of the cases it is beneficial, but that also depends on person to person. If you have elevated or fluctuating blood glucose levels, it is best not to exercise in that case. Let your blood glucose settle down and then you can start with the exercises.

3. With Diabetes in the Current Busy Lifestyle, How Can I Exercise?

Ans: If you feel you do not have enough time to dedicate to exercises, you can still do little things that can help. You can try yoga on your bed before sleeping and after waking up. You can cycle to and fro your office etc.

Diabetes is one of such diseases that might develop over a period of time and you might not even notice the symptoms. Once you know, it might not be reversible. Then exercise and controlled diet are going to be your life long companion and relief remedies.

In diabetes, you need to take utmost care of what you eat and how well you exercise. Continuous and committed efforts on diabetes exercise will always be advantageous for you. So work and stretch more, stress less.