Strength training eased back pain

[Sheree]
Hi, ladies out there, all my friends on Facebook. I haven't done a live for like about six months. I was the carer for my dad for quite a while.

So I've just decided to get back into some strength training stuff, which is my main thing that I love doing. And I love people like Angela. I want to welcome Angela here today.

Angela, thank you for coming on to my live.

[Angela]
Thank you, Cherie.

[Sheree]
Angela, just tell us a bit about yourself. Just how old you are and what sort of... I know you're retired now, but what sort of job did you do before you retired?

[Angela]
Yeah, I'm 68. And I used to be a registered... Well, I still am a registered nurse.

And I was managing aged care facilities, residential aged care facilities.

[Sheree]
And you did two at the one time, didn't you?

[Angela]
Yes, yeah. One of them, at one time I managed two together and that was a five year period.

[Sheree]
Yeah, wow.

[Angela]
And the last four years I've worked as a consultant within aged care.

[Sheree]
Yeah, yeah, okay. And how old are you, Angela?

[Angela]
68.

[Sheree]
Not that age means a thing. It truly does not. But sometimes it's good for somebody of the same age to go, I could never start strength training.

I could never actually start my walk with strength training. But you know what you can and you don't have to be a certain look, a certain age. You don't have to be anything.

You can start right where you're at. Angela, how long have you been doing it for?

[Angela]
About seven years on and off. Depending what my job was doing at the time.

[Sheree]
And was it that you started with us?

[Angela]
Yes, yes, Spice Fitness.

[Sheree]
Yeah, so it's Spice Fitness. How did you find us, Angela?

[Angela]
I had a friend whose daughter went. And because you were only down the road and I was actually going to, started going to another gym that I hated at six o'clock in the morning. I was, Spice Fitness was recommended to me.

[Sheree]
Okay, specifically what was said about it, just because it was a women's training facility and we know women like well, is that?

[Angela]
Yeah, absolutely. I was a bit larger than I am now and I wanted to lose a bit of weight. And I knew that walking upstairs was just a killer for me.

And I've been to gyms before and paid your annual rate, membership and only went for two or three weeks and then hated it.

[Sheree]
Okay.

[Angela]
But they were saying, oh no, it's really good. You know, people don't go in their Lycra. Oops.

[Sheree]
These are just really, really quite comfortable. Not Lycra at all. Yeah, yeah, no, you're right.

[Angela]
And I was very nervous for about the first three months. But you were so engaging, Cherie, that I just loved it. And the other women were there were lovely too.

They were all encouraging.

[Sheree]
Yeah, and don't you think that's one thing? I think if you feel like you're never going to be judged, but you are who you are and people can support you and just rah-rah you on with every small achievement, because the thing that everyone needs to realise is that no one starts doing all these things, pulling up big 12 kilo weights or whatever and not you have to ever do that. But fitness is a progression.

And I think wherever you're at, it's a good place to start.

[Angela]
Absolutely.

[Sheree]
So do you find, did you get stairs? You said that they were hard to do when you first came in. Did they get a bit easier after a while?

[Angela]
It certainly did, yes. Yeah.

[Sheree]
So Angela, how, you talk about your back pain because Angela's had chronic back pain and in fact only saw a surgeon, didn't you, last week?

[Angela]
Yes.

[Sheree]
And what was the talk all about? He wanted to operate and you don't?

[Angela]
Yes, he wanted major surgery. And at the time I signed the consent form. Yes, I'll do that.

And then later I thought, do I really want to do this? And he told me there was going to be a three month recovery period. And I thought, I haven't got time for three months recovery period.

You know, I've got the rest of my life to happen.

[Sheree]
So did you kind of feel for now at least you'll keep going with the strength training and keep making your body move, albeit safely, you don't want to make things worse and that's going to hold you for now?

[Angela]
Yes, I think while I've had this back pain, you've given me specific exercises to do at home and that's really helped. I started off doing them every day and now I do them alternate days. And I just do it as soon as I get up while I'm still in my pyjamas.

So I can't get anything, I can't be distracted with anything else.

[Sheree]
Yes, okay. For those of you that watch this, I know quite a few watch this afterwards and not live. If you did want those specific things that I gave Angela to do, it's all over at Fitball and they're all great things for that.

You just have to have a look at some of the comments on here. Great that you can join me ladies, great. Yeah, so if you want one of those specific exercises, they're not hard, they're in no way hard, but it's all done on a Fitball.

Fitballs are about $8. Well, at least here in Australia to buy, they're so cheap. And once you blow them up, they're there.

But I've given Angela some specific stuff to do. So it just strengthens those muscles in the back. Remembering that we have little muscles run down the spine, we've got big muscles, small muscles, but it works everything.

And so Angela started doing that little program at home and it has helped to quite a large degree. So if you want those, just please inbox me or just to put a comment down here, say, yes, please, I'd like those. And I'll send those to you.

Sorry, I shouldn't put my chair further forward. Yeah, hi, hi Kate. Good to see you, this is Kate Brown watching.

It's nice to see you. We should have come a bit closer to the camera. I haven't done one of these lives for so long.

I've forgotten how to do them. But anyway, next time we'll be closer. 

[Sheree]
So Angela, I guess your main motivation for continuing strength training is also the fact you've got one grandchild and one on the way.

[Angela]
Yes, yes. So my one grandchild is a one year old. And at the moment she needs to be picked up all the time and I have to be able to do that.

Yes. To be a successful grandma, you've got to be able to look after them. And so that at the moment is my motivation.

And of course with the second grandchild, Jude, I've got to be there.

[Sheree]
I've got to help. That's the job of a grandmother. You're right.

And you know what? Angela, it's not even now, but it's when they get to two and three and say, Grandma or Nana, whatever you call, can you come and roll on the ground with me? I want to play ball.

Or you just want to, you know, whatever it is with them, go to the playground and go up and down the slide because they go, hey, can you come down the slide with me? You're not going to be able to do that too well if you can't move.

[Angela]
Yes, absolutely.

[Sheree]
And what I've found too, my father recently passed away only three or four weeks ago now. But the fact is what helped him to stay home and this is what I've been having to think about this of late Angela, he would not have been able to be cared for me at home if he couldn't move. The good thing is that he could still get up and down off the bed.

He could move. He could walk around himself. He could move.

But if you can't move and you lose all sense of strength and not being able to move, your family's probably going to have to put you in an aged care home when you get to that age because they can't hoist you up and hoist you down all over the place that we have to do with some of our aged people. So do you think that's also important?

[Angela]
Oh, absolutely.

[Sheree]
Because you're at home alone, aren't you? Yes. Some of the time alone and sometimes with other people.

[Angela]
Yeah, I basically live by myself, yes.

[Sheree]
And so you don't want to have to rely on other people to give you around the home and do things for you.

[Angela]
No, no, no, absolutely not.

[Sheree]
I'm sure you've just got dreams to travel and do stuff. Oh, yes, absolutely. Because you get yourself out and off you go here and off you're in that sort of committee here and you're on a board place there.

[Angela]
So you get yourself out. Absolutely.

[Sheree]
So there's a whole lot of reasons, I guess. And you don't want to be tied down for three months because that is a long time.

[Angela]
Oh, yeah.

[Sheree]
And like Angela's back surgery, can I say, was going to be major, major surgery. It's not just a little in there and out. It's going through the whole front to get to the front of the spine.

It's huge. And so if you can, whatever you can do, I know that comes to a point with some people where they can't move anymore and obviously you need some surgery if you're at a place where your spine's totally gone. I get that.

But if you can, strength training will actually change a lot of what you do. So that would be your main motivation, Angela?

[Angela]
Absolutely, yes.

[Sheree]
To keep yourself going.

[Angela]
To keep me going, yes.

[Sheree]
Oh, I like that. So would you ever stop?

[Angela]
No.

[Sheree]
Oh, that's a very clear no.

[Angela]
Every now and again, I've stopped because of my work commitments. But I can't stop now. It's good.

It's good for me physically. It's good for me emotionally. And you get to see people and have a laugh.

And it's good fun.

[Sheree]
Good fun. It is fun. Because the thing is that when we strength train, it shouldn't be all about what you can do with your body.

It's not even about how you look. It's about how we function when we move. The way that we train is not like a bodybuilder.

So they might just train biceps and triceps in one day. That's it. That's all they train.

We don't do that because life is all about moving. Moving different ways, isn't it, Angela? When you pick up your little granddaughter, it's not just a pick up, do this for a whole half an hour.

You have to bend those legs, pick her up. You might use your biceps, triceps for a moment. You might need to twist and put her into her little baby bouncing it, whatever.

I don't know. Whatever you call things these days. But life is all about the way we move.

So when we train, it's all about how we move, not a particular muscle group. And that's the big difference between somebody that just trains for an actual muscle to look good as compared to how we train, which is functionally training to help you to move well with all your moves every day. And that's what's good.

[Angela]
Absolutely. Yeah.

[Sheree]
So Angela, is there anything else? Is there anything you'd like to say to someone out there? So I know that some of these people, let me just see if there's any more comments.

Congratulations, Angela. So Angela, is there anything that you would say to someone out there that is thinking, I am 60s, even 70s, even 80s.

It's never too late, even earlier than that. That kind of goes, you know, that's fine for her. She's been doing it for a few years now.

What would you say to that person? If they were sitting here in front of you and were going, I don't think I could do that, Angela, but good on you. What words would you give to them to get them inspired to train?

[Angela]
You can't just give in to age and turn into an old person. You've got to be in it to win it. You know, you've got to move and keep moving.

And it's all functional. It's what we actually need. And, you know, everything's hard to begin with, you know, absolutely everything.

But you just got to give it a go. And, you know, you just got to keep going. Try it once and then you're over the hurdle and you know what there is to expect next time.

And it really is good.

[Sheree]
And do you think, Angela, where you are today, because I know that when you first started with us, probably not so strong.

[Angela]
It was terrible. I couldn't do anything.

[Sheree]
I wasn't going to say that, Angela.

[Angela]
I can, I can.

[Sheree]
She can. But the fact is no one does start where they end. And in fact, it's always a process.

You might have a period like me, where I was a carer for my dad for about six months. And I pulled right back from training myself. So I've got to re-go back to wherever I start from and re-move forward from there.

So it's always a process. If Angela has a bad week with her back, I may not see her that week and that's fine. She needs to give her back a rest.

Or if you're tired, you don't sleep too well, I don't sleep well. Welcome to the Not Sleep Sleeping Well Club. And that's not a fun place to be.

So if you don't sleep well, your body's not going to be up to par to train as well as what you normally would. So it's more with Angela. If she hasn't had a good sleep, she may not come along to training and that's perfectly fine.

You've got to do, you've got to work with your body. Do you reckon, Angela?

[Angela]
Absolutely, yes.

[Sheree]
Feel it, sense it. You know what your back can do. You know what it can't do.

And so just knowing what you can and can't do.

[Angela]
Yeah.

[Sheree]
Great. Well, look, thank you so much for joining us. And I know some of you will be seeing this afterwards.

But thank you for joining us. And if you have any questions about strength training, I do strength train older women. My oldest client is an 89 year old.

And she has stayed upright and fit. And she won't stop because she knows how good it is for her. If you want to know more, please put me a comment in down below.

But I can also send you personally these back exercises I've done with Angela as well. So, Angela, I just want to thank you for joining me today. Thank you.

And just hopefully there's someone out there that has been spurred on today. There could be someone down the road from where you live. You could live in the UK or the US.

And it could be someone down the road that you've heard about that does strength training. Great. Otherwise, we have an online program as well for $5 US a week that you don't need to stay connected in and pull in or come out of.

But thank you so much for joining us. I'll just have a quick peep in here. Katharina, hi.

It's so good to keep you moving. Yes, it's so good. Moving's a good thing.

So, thank you, everyone, for joining us. And hopefully I'll get a few more clients in and have a bit of a chat to you about why they do what they do. Because I think it's important, not just me, saying strength training should be for everyone.

No one should be without strength training. We should all be doing it. So, thank you for joining me today.

Thank you. And all the best with staying away from that surgeon.

[Angela]
Oh, yes. As long as you can.

[Sheree]
She may not be able to do it forever. But you know, while you can and while you've got small grandkids, I think that's great to do what you're doing. So, thank you.

Thank you for joining us today. And I'm going to sign out here.

[Angela]
Bye.