Health and Breathing – The Benefit of Aerobic Exercise

To have more than you’ve got, become more than you are.

Jim Rohn

Just before I get into this discussion I would like to update you all on my training and fund raising efforts. The end of February I did my first 20 mile run and by the time I post this entry I will have completed a second. My Achilles injury has been healing really well and I am confident that it will clear up completely over the next few weeks. I continue to work on my running style so that I get the most from the run, it is difficult to fight against the embedded notion that you must work hard in order to become fit and improve your health when in fact all you are really doing is seeing how much suffering you can take before deciding it’s not worth it!! Not being one for suffering I will allow my body to tell me what’s right for me and enjoy the experience of every step I take right up to the finish line.

The really good news is that we have raised just over £400 with the promise of a further £500 so that is taking the pressure off a little. All the money donated will go to Children with Leukaemia in the names of work colleagues and friends who have died in service: they are Joe McVeigh, Hughie Workman, Vic Sproule and Malcolm Dawson, all good decent folks and it is a real honour to be able to pay tribute to them in such a meaningful way – I would like to thank their families for making this possible.

We still have a way to go and every penny counts so if you would like to lend your support you can do so at: http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/LLA2010. The money you donate will be put to use in saving human life, I cannot think of a more worthy endeavour. You can always contact me directly at liam.bolger@gmail.com

Thank you for your support and I hope you are getting something from our discussions here so let’s get into it.

Have you ever watched a baby breathe their belly rising and falling rhythmically and with no apparent conscious effort on their part everything natural just as it was intended. Then watch an adult and you will notice the breath goes to the chest and is much less pronounced in terms of movement to that of the baby. I believe this shallow breathing to be the cause of many illnesses and in today’s information age you won’t find it difficult to uncover research that supports my view.

An understanding of the difference between health and fitness is critical if we are to gain the maximum benefit from the exercise we do.
Fitness can be defined as a measure of physical performance such as how fast you can run a mile or a marathon or how many push-ups you can do.
Health is different in that it has to do with how well the various systems of the body function and it is our aim to ensure that the way in which we exercise benefits us in terms of both health and fitness. Nutrition and emotional state are also key in maintaining good health but for now we are concerned with breathing and movement. In order to understand more clearly the importance of what I am sharing with you here we are going to look at Lymph, what it does, how it works and then we will look at function of the Capillaries.

Lymph

Lymph is concerned with how effectively your body carries away the toxins produced as the body tries to protect itself from damage by foreign materials. If you have ever cut yourself where you haven’t actually bled such as a paper cut or perhaps a puncture and you see a clear liquid oozing from the cut that will be Lymph. Your entire body is soaked in lymph and there is a whole lymph vessel system that is just as complex as your blood vessels. Every human has a heat, arteries, veins, blood vessels and ultimately capillaries. You have just as many lymph vessels and capillaries as you have blood vessels and capillaries.

Capillaries flow past cells but do not actually connect to them. What happens is that the clear, watery blood plasma containing the oxygen, proteins, glucose and white blood cells "leaks" out through the capillary walls and flows around all the cells. The pores in the capillaries are too small to let red blood cells through and that is why lymph is clear rather than red. It is through the lymph that the cells receive their nutrients and oxygen.

Somehow, all of this lymph has to end up somewhere, so it is recirculated. The lymph capillaries and vessels pick up the lymph fluid and start pumping it away from the cells. Lymph in the lymph vessels eventually reaches a lymph node, there are about 100 nodes scattered throughout the body. Lymph nodes filter the lymph and also contain large numbers of white blood cells (a big part of the immune system), which remove foreign cells and debris from the lymph. When you get certain infections, the lymph nodes swell with billions of white blood cells working to clear the foreign cells causing the infection. The filtered lymph then flows back into the blood stream at certain points.

Here is the really important part, lymph vessels do not have an active pump like the heart. Instead, lymph vessels have one-way valves and it is muscle and respiratory motion that pumps the lymph and that is why movement and deep breathing to the belly, just as a baby does, is so important, it gets the lymph moving keeping the cells healthy.

Capillaries

The capillaries are where all of the important exchanges happen in the circulatory system. The capillaries are a single cell in diameter to aid fast and easy diffusion of gases, sugars and other nutrients to surrounding tissues.

Functions of capillaries

Capillaries have no smooth muscle surrounding them and have a diameter less than that of red blood cells; a red blood cell is typically 7 micrometers outside diameter, capillaries typically 5 micrometers inside diameter. The red blood cells must distort in order to pass through the capillaries. These small diameters of the capillaries provide a relatively large surface area for the exchange of gases and nutrients.

What capillaries do:
• In the lungs, carbon dioxide is exchanged for oxygen
• In the tissues, oxygen and carbon dioxide and nutrients and wastes are
exchanged
• In the kidneys, wastes are released to be eliminated from the body
• In the intestine, nutrients are picked up, and wastes released

The diameter of the capillaries both blood and lymph almost belies their importance, they are the givers and maintainers of life to our cells. Exercise is necessary to dilate the capillaries allowing them to feed our bodies tissues and to remove waste, lack of exercise and inactivity literally dries up the capillaries leaving cells reliant upon them vulnerable.

More recent research has shown thirty minutes walking a day to be more effective in the treatment of depression than prescription drugs. Disease (dis-ease) is a body not at ease and there is no better means of promoting emotional and physical health than through regular Gentle exercise so begin today, adopt the habit of breathing low to the belly holding it in and releasing it gently. Do this as often throughout the day as you can, if it helps count how long you breathe in for, hold it in for twice that time and exhale four times as long as it took to inhale but just make sure it is comfortable for you, do not stress your breathing doing this.

Exercise is to be enjoyed not endured so be gentle with your self and allow your body to dictate the pace. Know the good you are doing, start off slow and allow yourself to build up naturally there is nothing to be gained in forcing your body into a state of dis-ease. Breath deeply, take time to appreciate the world around you and most of all live in a state of gratitude - every day above ground is a great day!

Well that’s it for this entry I hope you have found it to be useful, we will speak again soon.

Until then,

Live out Loud

Liam