By Hallie Sikes, owner of Therapy for Living • In the midst of February it is hard to avoid the abundance of pink and red hearts that bedeck stores and offices all around. The month of love is also the month that the American Heart Association (AHA) wants to get us thinking about the physical heart, as well as the emotional. The latest statistics from the AHA, released just last month, show that 48 percent of Americans have some form of heart disease (that includes high blood pressure) and heart disease remains the No. 1 cause of death overall.
The thing is, heart disease is one of the most preventable illnesses humans can contend with. As a country, we are making progress in the war on obesity. Fewer people worldwide are smoking. Now the biggest, easiest, thing that we can do to combat heart disease is get up and move. Our sedentary lifestyles have become such a big deal that sitting has been declared the new smoking.
The medical and heart associations have been recommending for years that people get 30 minutes of challenging activity five days a week, but they are loosening up those guidelines. Studies are showing that even if you can’t get 30 minutes of continuous exercise, every little bit of movement helps. Maybe you start with getting up from the computer every hour and walking to get some water. Maybe you start with walking to get your daily coffee at the Speckled Paw or strolling down Main Street to take a look in the antique shop windows. As I regularly tell my physical therapy patients, you start wherever you start. The trick is just to get started and move a bit more each day. It’ll help strengthen your heart and muscles, lower your blood pressure and reduce your stress levels. That’s a lot of benefit from just a few extra steps.