Exercise Modifications for the Plus

I always get to an awkward point in yoga classes, and even in bellydance, when my body just won’t do something that everybody else’s will do. Some of these motions are things that I just have to work for – stretching my hamstring by grabbing my ankle behind me will happen but it will take daily work for a long time. Some of it is just that I’m not double-jointed. And much of it is that I’m just big.

While you can start with kind and gentle yoga or simple walking, if you want to move forward you need to start small and work on increasing your range of motion. It’s a positive cycle: improve your range of motion, increase your activity and find where you need to increase your range of motion, and keep going gradually and gently expanding what your body is able to do.

One thing I’ve discovered is that weight-lifting MUST be paired with stretching – you can increase muscle strength and lose flexibility if you don’t stretch extra.

I do this by going through a series of daily stretches and gently increased activity. Many of the plus size exercise DVDs on the markets are modified slightly, but work about as well as the beginners – it’s worth exploring them at your own pace to find what works for you.

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Tags: fitness, Range of motion, Stretching, Yoga

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 5th, 2009 at 8:00 am and is filed under Health. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.