Easy Exercises For Arthritis Pain
If you experience arthritis pain, then even the thought of exercise may seem impossible. However, it’s a vital aspect to living actively, improving joint health and reducing pain.
Studies show that those with arthritis actually experience less pain when they implement exercise into their routine. This may seem counterintuitive to you and your doctor may even be telling you to avoid exercise. Allow us to plug the benefits of exercise for you.
WAYS EXERCISE HELPS YOUR JOINTS
Exercise helps your joints in a number of ways, likely without causing your condition to worsen. There is a common misconception that you’ll irritate joint pain through activity. However, it’s actually a lack of exercise that (more commonly) can exacerbate arthritis, making your joints stiff and painful.
When you exercise consistently you can:
- Improve muscle strength around joints
- Maintain bone strength
- Improve balance to prevent falling
- Increase your energy levels
- Get deeper, restorative sleep
- Maintain your weight to prevent excess strain on joints
- Maintain your weight to reduce inflammatory cytokines that damage joints
When you strengthen the muscles around your bones and joints, you’re actually relieving some of the strain placed on them throughout the day, helping to reduce pain.
EXERCISES FOR ARTHRITIS PAIN
If it’s been a while since you’ve exercised, you’ll want to ease into your routine to avoid injury. Before you start exercising, you can apply heat with warm towels for about 20 minutes to warm up your joints and relieve pain so you’re better prepared to start.
We’d also suggest taking gentle and slow movements to avoid injury. Let yourself warm up for about five to ten minutes before moving onto the main portion of your exercise, whether it’s strength training or aerobic in nature.
You’ll also want to stick to low-impact exercises to reduce the amount of stress placed on your joints.
Range-of-motion exercises can help you improve joint movement and flexibility by taking them through the full range of motion. Some examples of this include, extending your arms over your head and rolling your shoulders either forward or backward. These can be helpful when reducing stiffness and even used to help warm up the joints.
Low-impact aerobic exercises are a great way to improve joint health, cardiovascular health and maintain your weight. Some low-impact aerobic exercises include swimming, walking, and bicycling. Exercising for about 150 minutes a week is ideal for maintaining your health.
We know that 150 minutes can sound like a lot, but when broken up across five days it’s only about 30 minutes a day. When you’re first starting out, you can even break this time down further. Walking for 10 minutes after each meal is a great place to start when you’re building up to an exercise routine.
Strength training is also important for what we noted earlier about building strength in the muscles that surround your joints. You’ll want to take it slow to start, while you learn proper techniques and your body gets used to your new routine.
As with any exercise, it’s important to rest properly between workouts. You don’t want to overwork parts of your body without giving yourself time to recuperate.
For exercise that improves balance and flexibility, you might also be interested in yoga. Yoga can promote balance, flexibility, core strength, relaxation and mindfulness. It’s also low impact and can be done at varying skill levels. We do recommend visiting a yoga studio and practicing with a yogi who can teach you safe and proper techniques for different poses.
Reducing arthritis pain and inflammation can be a lot of work, and you might be used to taking anti-inflammatories to reduce pain. However, NSAIDs can produce painful side effects, especially in the long-term.
At Well Theory, we have several supplements that can reduce inflammation and joint pain. Our Arthritis Bundle features two of our most popular supplements, Tart Cherry Extract and our Joint Health Multi.
Tart Cherry Extract is an antioxidant supplement that works in the same way as NSAIDs to reduce inflammation, but in a more gentle manner. Our Joint Health Multi is a unique combination of turmeric, ginger, piperine, and PEA. When taken together, these supplements work synergistically to reduce arthritis associated pain.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Dr. Meredith Warner is the creator of Well Theory and The Healing Sole. She is a board-certified Orthopedic Surgeon and Air Force Veteran.
She is on a mission to disrupt traditional medicine practices and promote betterment physically, spiritually and mentally to many more people. She advocates for wellness and functional health over big pharma so more people can age vibrantly with more function and less pain.
At Well Theory, Our surgeon-designed products are FDA Registered and formulated to help people:
- Manage the symptoms of musculoskeletal pain
- Recover vibrantly from orthopedic related surgeries
- Fill the gaps in our daily diets
- Manage pain associated with inflammation