6 Water tips for tone Health & Wellness

Live Long, Live Well Jodi R. Cornelio, AS, BA, MBA Nutritionist, Personal Trainer and Motivational Speaker jcornelio@turnerpublishing.net

It’s finally that time of year when we can get into the pool or lake and work on our balance and conditioning while getting a little vitamin D from the sunlight. Water exercise is great for everyone not only for strength conditioning and balance, but it is extremely beneficial for those with arthritis, joint pain, joint replacement, back issues, fibromyalgia and neurological issues.

Keep in mind the following while exercising in the lake or pool • The water should be waist to chest high. • Wearing a pair of boat/ water shoes will help with traction and help prevent slipping. • Never push through pain while exercising. That is your body’s signal to stop. • Keep a noodle or floatation devise handy for balance and safety. • Always consult with your doctor if you have a special condition to see if water exercise is right for you.

The following 6 Exercise are fun and easy to do: 1. Water walking and jogging: Take 10 steps forward and 10 steps backwards while pushing your arms and legs through the water. You can also just walk around the entire perimeter of the pool as a warm up. After your walk around just stand in place and start jogging, raising your knees as high as you can and continue for 5 minutes or as long as you can. This is a great warm up and healthy for your heart and lungs and overall cardio conditioning. 2. Water lunges: Take a big giant step forward with your right leg, return and repeat with your left leg. Do this 10 times on each side and then repeat for 3 more sets. This is a great exercise for lower body strength. 3. One leg balance: Bring one knee into your chest while supporting your body with your other leg. Hold for 30 seconds. Repeat this on the other side and continue to do 3 sets. This is great for balance something we all need and should focus on as we age. 4. Straight leg hip flexor kicks. Hold onto the side of the pool or if in the lake you may want to hold onto your noodle or dock edge. Kick your right leg straight out and up hip high and return. Repeat on the other side for 12 to 20 kicks. This is great for your lower back and abs. This also helps strengthen the muscles supporting your hips. 5. The water is so great for conditioning your arms: simply move your arms back and forth while walking or standing still, make little circles in the water front and back. Basically any motion you can under the water will help tone and condition the arms. 6. Flutter kicks: This is the most fun and the most basic. It’s a great cool down. Just hold onto your noodle in front of you floating on your belly and kick your feet as hard as you can until you get winded. Once winded slow it down and just coast.

I hope these water tips for tone and balance will help you enjoy your summer in a safe and healthy way.

Live Long, Live Well

Diane Atwood

If you were to meet Heidi Fox — a 20-year-old college student from Maine — it would probably never occur to you that she was anything but well and healthy. That’s exactly how it was when she was 13 and in the eighth grade. Up until that point, everything seemed normal and then, her soccer coach suddenly stopped playing her in games.

“I said I’m working really hard, why aren’t you letting me play? And he said, it looks like you’re in pain when you’re running. I didn’t feel like I was in pain, but I had a limp that got worse and worse really fast. And then, I did start noticing that I was walking weird, but there still wasn’t any pain for me.” (Heidi Fox)

Her parents took her to the pediatrician and by then, she wasn’t able to stand on her toes. Again, no pain, she just couldn’t do it.

“The pediatrician did some strength testing and said she’s got some weakness in her lower legs, so let’s try some physical therapy,” explained Heidi’s father Brain Fox. “The physical therapist worked with her for maybe 20 minutes the first day and he looked at us and said something is really not right here. He called her pediatrician and the next thing we knew, we were taking her for an MRI.”

The MRI showed what appeared to be a cyst in Heidi’s spine. She was scheduled to have back surgery when the pediatric neurosurgeon who was now on her case, decided to order a second MRI with contrast to make sure the cyst wasn’t cancerous. Instead of only looking at her spine, the radiologist who did the second MRI decided to also take a look at Heidi’s skull. He discovered that she didn’t have a cyst, but a rare condition called Chiari (keyAR-ee) malformation.

Her cerebellum, which is the part of the brain that controls balance, coordination and muscle movement, had pushed through the hole at the bottom of her skull. The hole is called the foramen and it’s meant only for the spinal cord. Chiari usually occurs because the part of the skull that holds the cerebellum did not develop properly — it’s either too small or misshapen. It’s primarily congenital but has been known to happen with trauma, although rarely.

When the brain extends down into the foramen, the blockage can prevent spinal fluid from circulating as it should between the brain and the spinal canal. The spinal fluid gradually collects where it shouldn’t and

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causes increased pressure on the brain and spinal cord, which can lead to a variety of symptoms.

Heidi’s parents were filled with gratitude that the radiologist decided to look at her spine and her head.”Instead of just having a cyst in her back,” said her mother Lili Fox, “her whole spinal column was fluid filled with one spot that was more swollen. That was the reason the radiologist went beyond. We wrote a letter of thanks because he went way beyond where he was supposed to and we said thank God you took the initiative to do that. Had he not gone up and seen the Chiari then she would have had a back surgery she didn’t need.”

Signs and symptoms of Chiari malformation

Signs of Chiari may be present on a prenatal ultrasound, at birth, or as in Heidi’s case, may not show up until adolescence or early adulthood. Some people may never have any symptoms at all and may only discover they have Chiari when tests are done for other reasons.

The symptoms that kept Heidi out of her soccer games came on quite suddenly. “Two weeks before we were visiting friends in North Carolina and they did this crazy little YouTube video,” said Lili. “She was running and there was absolutely nothing wrong. Within a two week period, it reached that point. It was crazy fast.”

Here is a list of common Chiari signs and symptoms:

• Unsteady gait and problems with balance

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