- Before my diagnosis of younger-onset Alzheimer's, you'd never catch me in a gym, but now, I look forward to each exercise session. I treat it like medicine. It's just something I have to do if I want to live well with dementia. I'm Jim Rogers, and this is Hold the Moment, a podcast from Dementia Australia. It's full of stories about life after diagnosis. We have a whole episode on exercise you can download in your podcast app right now.
In it, I head to the gym with my trainer, Nick, and we meet Heather, who loves line dancing, walking her dogs, and even running marathons to stay active. This is our bonus episode on exercise with an advisor from the National Dementia HelpLine. So whether you prefer to swim laps, try something new like yoga, or you just want to keep active in your garden, here's some advice. - I'm Kristin, an advisor on the National Dementia Helpline. When you call us, you'll speak to someone like me.
We're available 24-hours a day, every day of the year. So, you might be feeling a bit overwhelmed after a diagnosis of dementia with all the changes that people are suggesting. If you have an exercise routine that you like, you can keep doing that if it feels like it's safe and makes you feel good, go for it. If exercise is something new that you're looking to include in your routine, then you might have to think about how it might fit.
Now, that doesn't mean you have to start running marathons today. That might mean you park a little further away and walk to the shops, or maybe you've always wanted to join the community garden so you can go meet some new people, and get digging in the dirt.
If you're wondering about how physical activity can help with dementia, there are some of the physical health benefits that everybody thinks about with exercise, getting stronger, building up muscles, but there's a number of other things that exercise can help with, things like improving your mood, you'll feel better if you're on the move. It can make you feel more confident in yourself that you're able to do things that maybe you couldn't do before if you practiced them enough.
And there's also a social piece. If you're sharing exercise of any kind with other people, you might meet some new friends, and that's also important. It does seem like there's some research that suggests that exercise regularly can help slow the progression, especially if some of the symptoms that you're experiencing are physical, so you can build up strength that reduces the chance of falls, and gives you confidence again in moving through the world.
The types of exercise that you do really comes down to you. What sorts of things do you enjoy? What do you love? What makes you smile, and feel good, and strong, and confident? If you've run marathons before, that's great, you can keep running, but if what you really love is dogs, walk yourself up to the local dog park, throw a couple of balls for the dogs there. It's really about finding what makes you feel good inside, doing a bit more of that.
And if you're the adventurous type, you could try something new, something you've always been interested in. Look in your local council for something that might be going on like Tai Chi, if you've never tried that, you could give something new a try too. What's really important is finding an exercise that you like to do, something that makes you feel good, that makes you feel strong, and that you enjoy doing.
- If you want to talk more about keeping active with dementia you can contact the National Dementia Helpline on 1800 100 500, and speak to an advisor just like Kristin. The helpline is available 24-hours a day, every day of the year, and there's lots more episodes of Hold the Moment in your podcast app right now, so do follow the show, or have a friend or family member help you access each episode.