Here's part 5 of a Parade article that offers interesting facts on how fitness can help both your mind and your health -- both of which are more important than money (see How to Preserve and Protect Your Memory and Make It Grow and More Important than Money: Your Health for details). Today, we'll see how exercise may help relieve moderate depression:
Researchers at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center showed that 30 to 35 minutes of aerobics, three to five times a week, reduced moderate depressive symptoms by almost 50%. “The effect of using exercise alone to treat the condition is comparable to the effects of antidepressants,” concludes researcher Dr. Madhukar Trivedi.
My thoughts:
1. Funny -- I'm most depressed BEFORE a workout, when I know I have an hour's worth of pain ahead of me. ;-)
2. With all these positive benefits of exercise, why WOULDN'T people exercise?
3. If you don't exercise, make a plan to start. It will not only improve your health, but also save you a boatload of money. (And while you're at it, cut out those vices to help your health and pocketbook even more.) As we've seen in this series, you don't have to run a marathon or bike 100 miles to see the benefits of exercising. Just get out and walk, do some chores every day, garden and the like. These simple tasks deliver substantial benefits that will improve your quality of life in many different ways.
But if you do want to run a marathon, that's good too...heheh.
Posted by: Blaine Moore (Run to Win) | May 22, 2006 at 09:14 AM