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What’s More Important For Good Health: Sleep or Exercise?

sleep or exercise

Have you found yourself in a predicament where you stayed up too late, got only a few hours of sleep, woke up groggy and went half asleep to the gym? But what is actually good for you – is it sleep or exercise? Both, actually! Sleep and exercise are key components of a healthy lifestyle. You can’t choose between sleep or exercise, as you need both. Slacking on either one of them can affect the other.

What Happens When You Sleep Late and Wake Up Early?

Due to minimal sleep, your circadian rhythms shifts. This means you’re “exercising during your biological night” when you should still be sleeping and that’s counterproductive. Your muscle cells, which also have circadian rhythms, recover and perform better during your body’s biological daytime than they do during the biological night.

Obviously, working out when your whole body is awake is crucial when it comes to your muscles and getting a proper amount of sleep also helps prevent injuries during exercises. In fact, a lack of sleep can weaken your immune system (which prevents you from working out) and can also lead to weight gain and health issues like cardiovascular disease and diabetes, i.e. precisely what exercise aims to prevent. But on the flipside, regular exercise promotes more restful sleep. So, working out at the right time can actually bank you some quality shut-eye rather than curb it.

How To Sleep Better For Better Exercise?

Whether you need to set an earlier bedtime or find a different window for working out, make sure you’re not putting yourself in the position to decide between these two titan pillars of wellness. Consider revolutionizing your to-do-list routine in a way that makes you happier to achieve these goals.

Stay away from heavy and oily foods before bed for better sleep. Also, keep away from electronics an hour before you go to bed as the back-light from your cellphones can affect your sleep. Try to be as comfortable as possible, which means wear loose clothing and keep yourself warm.

Try these tips to sleep better. In fact, you can also try breathing exercises to help you get better sleep: Click here to know more.

We hope this article has helped you and you don’t need to choose between sleep or exercise! To get more information like this from certified experts, subscribe for GOQii’s Personalised Health Coaching here.

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Excercises: Pre-Pregnancy: A good start is half done!

Planning to start a family is a crucial decision, in fact, a life changing one, and preparing yourself well for the most important time of your life, will ensure a healthier you and a healthier baby. If you have made up your mind for the next big move, this blog will give you an insight into the exercise part of this beginning.

A workout routine developed before getting pregnant will help you stay in the healthier BMI range, will help you beat stress through release of the feel-good hormone – endorphins, and will help you sleep better through the night, thus will create an optimal environment for natural conception. Additionally, it will help you sustain a healthy pregnancy and develop your stamina for the rigors of childbirth and recovery, and finally, it will assist you in getting back in shape and to your pre-pregnancy fitness levels!

A good deal eh? So let’s learn how you can plan your exercise regime:

A) If you are a beginner: take it easy and gradually. 20 -30 minutes at a minimum three times a week will be good to go.

  1. Start with a low impact aerobic exercise – walking, dancing, cycling. These will race up your heart and exercise your lungs.
  2. Another good one is Swimming – it will make you feel lighter and work out your whole body without straining your joints.
  3. Relaxing workouts include yoga, which with the right postures will help in toning your reproductive organs too.
  4. A Pilates workout under guidance will help strengthen your core and pelvic muscles.
  5. Weight training under supervision will work out your muscles to prepare them for infant care. Use lighter weights and learn the correct training technique, but remember weight training is to be avoided during pregnancy.
  6. Practice exercises for pregnancy and active labor – these will include squatting, lunges, pelvic floor exercises, and breathing exercises. Starting to do them now will make it easier to continue after the big news.

B) If you are a pro: you are doing one of the best jobs for yourself and your fertility. But like with every other good thing, too much of it can still do more harm than good when you are trying to conceive. This is so because exercises are considered as a stress to the system and the body shuts down its reproductive functions in stressful events. Moreover, workouts are linked to changes in a woman’s hormonal system that may interfere with implantation of a fertilized egg. Then, is it fine for a man to exercise intensely during pre-conception phase? No actually not. The male partner must also re-evaluate his workouts and dial down the intensity of his routine so as to avoid the risk of decreasing his sperm counts (which happens due to excessive heat generation during exercises).

Now the question is when do you draw the line?

Well, it will depend on your BMI

#If you fall in overweight BMI range (>27), there is no reason to tone down your exercises, since obesity impairs fertility more than excessive exercising.

#If you fall in normal weight BMI range, bring down your workout intensity from vigorous to moderate. Like if you are running, start jogging and avoid vigorous gymnastics, aerobics, cycling and even swimming. Make them more leisurely so that you are not devoting more than 5 hours a week to these workouts.

#If you fall in underweight BMI range (<18), check your workout intensity and lighten it again so that along with good nutrition, you can soon move up to healthy weight range for early conception.

Now a word of caution for Female Athletes- if your form of exercise (including power yoga) is above moderate and leaves you extremely weak, winded, and gasping for breath or alters your menstrual cycles, then it’s time to tone down the frequency, pace, and duration of your workouts. This surely doesn’t mean you can’t run/cycle or must leave your weight lifting career for making a baby, but then, of course, this won’t be the ideal time to prepare for a marathon/triathlon or for buffing up for an upcoming championship.

Furthermore, certain contact Sports like Judo, Karate, Football etc., which may cause sudden jolts/falls and abdominal punching, may become unsuitable when you eventually fall pregnant. So trying now to hone your skills in them or, for that matter, in activities like downhill skiing, horseback riding, scuba diving, mountain biking etc., may not be useful. Save them for your post pregnancy to do list!

Lastly, a well-rounded preparation consists of other factors too. So a wholesome diet, folate supplements, sound sleep, no alcohol/smoking, avoiding caffeine and reducing stress will form a crucial foundation of your prenatal preparation along with, as I mentioned above, EXERCISING regularly.

Hope you find this article useful and that it answers all your questions regarding exercises before your Big Fat Positive. Take care and I’ll see you in the next chapter of Pregnancy! For further information or guidance, reach out to our certified experts by subscribing to GOQii’s Personalised Health Coaching here.

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Hypertension: Cause for all heart issues

heart-failure2

Heart is one of the most important organs of our body, and keeping it healthy is important. Heart connects the entire body through its vital functions.

What does the heart exactly do? Why is it related to blood pressure?

This small fist like structure works hard to maintain blood flow to our body day and night. Fundamentally, it takes all the impure blood from the body, makes it pure with lots of Oxygen (fresh air), and sends it back. While doing this, it also contracts and relaxes (medically termed it as systolic and diastolic, respectively) in between a single beat. In normal course, if the person is healthy this happens smoothly without much pressure on it. Normal blood pressure levels should be 120/80 mm/hg.

Blood pressure is the culprit to heart issues. It’s natural to increase our blood pressure due to certain unpleasant situations, but if the blood pressure stays elevated for longer periods, then it turns into hypertension.

Causes for increased blood pressure:

  • Stress
  • Smoking
  • Alcohol
  • Obesity
  • Less water intake
  • High salt intake
  • Intake of more processed or bakery food.
  • Junk food or less fibrous food Intake
  • Less activity
  • Less sleep
  • Kidney disorders
  • Heredity
  • High fat food intake

All of these lead to plaque formation in the tiny blood vessels, due to which heart has to put more pressure than usual for a smooth blood flow. When it goes beyond the heart’s limit (it has muscles, after all) it stops pumping blood (which carries water, nutrients, and oxygen) thus it results in heart attack.

The good news is that one can avoid high blood pressure and avert heart attacks by just taking care of our daily meals, activities, water, sleep, stress etc. in short keeping a check on our lifestyle.

We need to improve all micro habits which set into our routine. Once you set yourself a routine, it’s difficult to break it.

Salt is the crucial factor that can lead to high blood pressure. Salt is a combination of sodium and chloride. Daily requirement of sodium is 1500mg to 2300mg, which means we can include approximately 1 teaspoon of salt. Sodium is also found in baking soda, monosodium glutamate (MSG), various seasonings, additives, condiments, meat, fish, poultry, dairy foods, eggs, smoked meats, olives, and pickled foods. High sodium directly contributes to high blood pressure.

Here are some heart friendly food options I have listed down for you

Antioxidants (green tea, red wine)

Fiber and Vitamin K (green leafy vegetables, whole grains, beans, whole pulses)

Whole Fruits

Omega 3 and Omega 6 fats (Almonds, walnuts, flax seeds, fish like salmon, sardines, mackerel, herring, tuna, avocado)

Ample amount of water intake.

Doing regular breathing exercises help us increase our Oxygen uptake.

Yoga, meditation or giving time to your hobbies keeps stress at bay.

Staying active through the entire day or indulging in any type of activity or game you enjoy can keep stress levels under check.

Maintaining heart health starts with managing your blood pressure. By making mindful choices in your diet, staying active, managing stress, and staying hydrated, you can significantly reduce the risk of hypertension and heart disease. Share your thoughts and experiences in the comments below. For more health tips and personalised guidance,speak to a certified expert by subscribing to GOQii’s Personalised Health Coaching here. Take control of your heart health today!

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Is DOMS stopping you from workout?

powercouple_rotatorThe moment I recommend intense workout to my players, they start saying this:-

“My body is paining, the workout which we did yesterday was not for me”

“I guess I did wrong workout, my body is paining today”

“I guess I pushed it beyond my capacity, is that the way it should be?”

In none of the above cases my players said, let me workout today and see if it is still there. Everyone says that I just cannot do the workout today, I need a break. So a question arises here is, should you workout with so called post workout pain?

Let me clear out some facts!

Technically, Soreness is of 2 types:-

(1) Acute muscle soreness

– Which is felt shortly after the workout but it disappears in few hours.

(2) The pain or the numbness which you feel post workout is not a pain. It is DOMS!

DOMS – Delayed onset muscle soreness.

– DOMS is typically begins within 12-24 hours after exercise and it can last up to 72 hours.

couple-workout

What happens during DOMS?

DOMS develop as a result of microscopic damage to muscle fibers which are involved in the type of exercise you are doing.

This damage can be because of the excess stress on particular part of the body during the exercise regime. DOMS is basically a side effect because of damage to the repairing process of the body.

Does lactic acid play an important role in DOMS?

Well, I have heard this quite often that the pain in my body is because of lactic acid accumulation. Just to get the facts out lactic acid does have an important role in acute soreness but not DOMS.

It has absolutely nothing to with your DOMS.

What causes DOMS?

Activities which leads to lengthening of muscles with excessive force leads to DOMS.

These are the most common examples of activities causing DOMS :-

– Jumping exercises

– Aerobic exercises

– Jogging

– Crossfit

– Strength training exercises

– High intensity interval training

Severity of DOMS completely depends upon the type and intensity of force applied on that muscle during that activity. Higher number of repetitions causes more DOMS then lower number of repetitions.

Can DOMS occur to everyone?

Well, yes DOMS can occur to everyone who is exercising. It is a myth that DOMS can occur to only those people who are new to exercises.

It can happen to people who are working out since ages as well but, the only difference will be the severity of DOMS.

If you are exercising since long time, your body gets adapted to it as a result your performance will not be affected completely.

If you keep training yourself for the same activity for years, you become less susceptible to DOMS in that particular exercise or activity.

Is soreness the only cause of DOMS?

Well no. Here are some most common symptoms of DOMS other than soreness:-

– Swelling in the area of extreme pain

– Stiffness of joints

– Tenderness

– Reduced strength

Should you workout the next day with soreness?

Most of players say, they just can’t workout because of the pain. If the pain is extreme and unbearable it is okay not to do extreme exercise but, it completely okay to do some light workouts or something as simple as stretching.

If you try and workout the next day, the symptoms of DOMS will start vanishing while you are performing the activity but there are chances that they might reoccur post workout (In your recovery process).

Don’t work out on the same muscle groups after DOMS. For example, if you are having severe soreness post jogging then you can workout on your upper body the next day. There is absolutely no need for – NO WORKOUT!

If the symptoms are extremely unbearable and excruciating then yes, do not workout.

How to ease DOMS?

  • To reduce the symptoms, apply ice pack on the area where it is paining
  • Gentle massage

These are just to reduce the symptoms but the complete healing can take place only after the exact diagnosis.

How to prevent DOMS?

If you undergo severe DOMS on your first day of your workout you probably have might done something wrong.

Check for these points before doing your next workout:-

* Proper form:- You need to be extremely careful while doing exercises especially the one with weights.

* Progression should be extremely personalised:- It should always be started at a slow pace and it should be light with least repetitions (2 different people cannot do the same intensity exercises – It should be personalised)

* Intensity plays a very important role:- It should be started with low intensity depending upon the muscle strength and then it should be gradually increased.

Once you start taking care about these points and train yourself, your body will start preparing itself for the same exercise in future.

Remember the old adage that says there is NO GAIN, WITHOUT PAIN!

DOMS cannot be completely avoided but, the severity can be reduced by taking care about the points mentioned above!

– Light pain cannot stop you from working out.

– Sometimes working out the next day makes you to recover faster!

So the crux of this entire article is, please do not skip workouts because of your soreness! Go ahead and do some light exercises or target a different set of exercises!

We hope this article helps you better understand DOMS and how to manage it. Do you have any tips for dealing with post-workout soreness? Let us know in the comments below. For more interesting tips on fitness and recovery, check out Healthy Reads or speak to a certified expert by subscribing to GOQii’s Personalised Health Coaching here.

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