My Answer to Breast Cancer

Hi there. It's Dr. Jen Simmons from Rural Health MD. Let's talk about fitness tonight. Let's talk about movement. Let's talk about the benefits of exercise. I think that so many people think of exercise as torture. I also think that people mostly associate exercise with losing weight. And I know that there's a connection to fitness in most people's minds, but for the most part, they associate exercise with a necessary evil to losing weight. And I don't want to dismiss that in that weight loss often accompanies exercise, but weight loss is about so much more. Weight loss is mostly about what you eat and how you eat and when you eat. Although movement can certainly facilitate weight loss for some people, it can help people maintain their weight. But there's so much more to exercise than just weight loss. And especially, especially, especially in the cancer community. So sedentary lifestyle is, is not a negative. Like, it doesn't have no effect on cancer growth. It actually has a negative effect on cancer growth. So the less movement you're doing, the more likely it is that the cancer will advance, continue to grow, that kind of thing. It's very, very important for everyone who has cancer, they have some kind of movement routine. I think people generally associate cancer and cancer treatment with a state of chronic fatigue. And that oftentimes is true, but that is certainly without question worsened by being sedentary. And the less you do, the less you can do. And conversely, the more you do, the more you can do, and the more you move, the more you oxygenate. And that state of oxygenation, of being full of oxygen is very good for your cells, very good for your normal cells, and very cancer cells, which are generally anaerobic, so they thrive in a less oxygenated environment, which sitting on the couch is a perfect situation for them. Less blood flow, less delivery of oxygen, more growth of cancer cells and a depression of normal cells. And speaking of depression and exercise is as good as or better than any of the drugs on the market to treat depression. So I'm just going to say that again and have people really hold on to that and hear that and absorb that, because I think that that's really important to know that for all of those people, and there are millions of people out there on antidepressants, exercise is as good as or better in every single study looking at head to head evaluations of exercise versus antidepressant medications. So if that is something that motivates you, then please know that all of those side effects that come along with those antidepressant drugs are Non existent in exercise, exercise just makes you happy and less depressed. So, so let's run down some of the things that exercise does. So we already talked about the fact that exercise can decrease depression. It actually makes you happy. You have the release of endorphins when you exercise. Now you have to be selective about the kind of exercise you do. If you think that exercise is torture, then it's not going to have the same benefit as if you choose something that makes you happy or makes you joyous. But even if you're not in the mood to exercise, so even though you like that activity, but you're just not in the mood for it right now, get up and do it. Because as soon as you get into it and those endorphins start going, you'll remember why you were there and feel so good about it afterwards. So we know that exercise improves mood, it prevents depression, it also has profound effects on your health. So exercise, as you get your heart pumping, increases oxygenation, increases oxygen delivery, and as a result of needing to increase oxygen delivery, it dilates your blood vessels. And so it actually lowers your blood pressure. Which is why people who start an exercise routine get to come off of their blood pressure medication. Because not only does it lower your blood pressure in the moment that you're exercising, but it also has lasting effects on the health of your blood vessels and lowers your blood pressure overall. The other thing it also does is it lowers your blood sugar, it helps to balance your blood sugar, and it does that through a number of mechanisms. But overall, it also decreases insulin levels. And insulin is a growth hormone. It also most of the cancers that we are affected by in this society, and especially breast cancers, these are insulin dependent growth pathways. So by lowering your circulating insulin, you're lowering the growth pattern of that cancer. So we know that exercise decreases insulin, decreases blood sugar, so gets rid of the fuel for cancers, and therefore decreases cancer growth, growth. Exercise also improves our detoxification pathways, especially exercising, that causes you to sweat. And so as we increase our detoxification pathways, we get rid of toxins and therefore we have less of a toxic burden on our body. And our chemistry can shift back to that balanced state. And so that also prevents cancer or prevents the propagation of cancer. Exercise improves the appearance and the quality of our skin, and we all want good skin. Exercise will improve self confidence, it will improve mentation, because you increase blood flow to the brain. It will also, as it improves self confidence and improves blood flow, it also improves sex. Everyone wants to have better sex and more meaningful sex. And as you have a better sense of self as you have better blood flow, as you have better chemistry. All of that goes along with having better sex. So exercise will also boost your immunity. It actually increases the number of circulating immune cells. And cancer is for lack of a better wor, an immune deficient state. So by increasing your immunity, you decrease your cancer burden, you help your body fight against cancer, and you also prevent cancer. So there are so many benefits to exercise that go far beyond weight loss. I mean, weight loss, of course, is a wonderful bonus, but there are so many health benefits that go along with exercise. Oh, and I forgot to say that exercise also lowers your C reactive protein. That is one of the markers of inflammation that we use to judge people's progress in treatment and what their baseline inflammation is, what the risks of disease progression are. And so by lowering C reactive protein, we know that you're. That there is some equilibrium coming into play. You're getting rid of that circulating inflammation which is at the root of all kinds of cancers and other chronic diseases. So when we talk about exercise, of course that's going to mean something different to everyone. There are four different categories that I want you to keep in mind as you formulate your movement plan. Of course, we talk about cardiovascular exercise, getting your heart rate up, sweating, those kinds of things. And you can do that however you want to do that. I particularly like rebounding. I think that on a mini trampoline, it's a great way to involve your whole body, engage your whole body. There's a lot of core work, a lot of balance work there, but there's also cardiovascular. And so that's a great way. And it makes you sweat. It increases blood, throat, blood flow through the kidneys. So if you have to get off and pee after 10 minutes, don't worry, you're not alone. Everyone has to get off and pee after 10 minutes, but then get back on again. And so it's great for detoxification, and I love that in cancer patients. But quite frankly, even an hour of walking a week, right, that's nothing. One hour of walking a week will decrease the chances that you'll die of breast cancer by 50%. These are astounding numbers. So it doesn't take much, it doesn't take much exercise to really, truly make a difference in your outcome and how you do. So if walking is your thing, walk. If running is your thing, run. If biking is your thing, bike. Like, whatever your thing is, do your thing, do your thing. Ideally, you're going to do it for 40 minutes a day. But you're aiming for 150 minutes a week of moderate exercise or 75 minutes a week of heavy exercise, heavy exertion. But it doesn't even have to be that. Just get your time in, whatever it is. If you're just starting out and you just want to do five minutes a day, great. Set a super achievable attainable goal and do that five minutes a day. Great. Do it. And you'll do your five minutes and say, oh, my God, that was nothing. I can do 10. Oh, my God, that was nothing. I can do 15. I can do 20. And work your way up by both extending your time and increasing the frequency with which you do it. And it doesn't have to be all at once. You can walk for 15 minutes in the morning and 15 minutes in the evening. Like it literally doesn't matter. In addition to your cardiovascular, you need to lift something heavy. You need to lift something heavy a couple times a week. You don't have to weight train. You don't have to be in the gym with the lunk. What was that commercial? I lift things up and put them down. Like, you don't. You don't have to be a lunk, but you do need to lift something heavy to remind your muscles of their strength. So you want to do some kind of strength training. It can be yoga. Yoga checks off so many boxes in the cancer world in terms of it helps with your mindfulness practice, it helps with your breathing. It allows you to be in the moment. It also gives you flexibility and strength and all of those things. A plank supporting your own body weight is resistance training is weight training. So make sure that you're doing some kind of resistance training where you're asking where you're putting some force against your muscles. The third category. So we talked about cardiovascular, we talked about resistance training. The third category is flexibility. Because we need to keep those muscles supple and flexible. So you need to work on your flexibility. And the only way that you're going to improve flexibility is to work on it. So you're just going to have to stretch. And whether it's someone stretching you or you doing passive stretching or using one of those muscle rollers, any way you do it, you need to keep your muscles hydrated and supple. So the fourth thing is balance. Balance is so very important because as we age, we lose balance. That's why we see old people fall all the time. And the reason that we lose balance is because we're losing that connection between the mind and the body. And the way that we maintain and strengthen that connection is to do balance work. So again, yoga checks a lot of boxes. Yoga has cardiovascular fitness, it has strength training, it has balance and it has all of the meditative practices. So in terms of balance, there are lots of yoga poses. A simple tree pose is something that really helps you to work on balance. The lunges help you to work on balance. So doing any of those balance exercises, you, even one day a week, even one day a week is enough to maintain that connection. You want to maintain that connection. So I hope that this little talk has given you an idea of the wonderful, tremendous benefits of exercise. They are vast. It applies to everyone and literally from 6 to 120 years old, there should be some active fitness built in. Your children need it, your teenagers need it, the young adults need it, the middle aged need it. And everyone to the elderly, everyone needs it. And there are benefits at every step along the way. And the quick, and the quickest way to age is to live a sedentary lifestyle, but to keep moving, to keep active and make, and make the movement a part of your daily routine. Make sure that you do it building into your schedule. It is super important. Treat it that way and your body, your mind and your health. Well, thank you. It's Dr. Jen Simmons from Rural Health MD. Bye for now.