move – Page 6 – Personal Euphoria: Pilates & Fitness Classes in CT

Movement Beats Polio

My Grandma inside the igloo!

My grandma contracted polio when she was nine. She was so sick her mother had to push her in a baby carriage to walk her to the hospital. She was embarrassed and mad at her mom because she was nine and didn’t belong in a baby carriage. No one else in the Waterbury area had been diagnosed with polio so at first the doctors didn’t know what was wrong. Before long there was an entire ward of children with polio.

For six month, my grandma was strapped to a wooden plank to immobilize her. It was the early thirties. The hospitals didn’t have air conditioning and she talks about how hot it could get in the room she shared with a group of polio-infected children. Those that died were wheeled out. One of her best memories from her time in the hospital was on summer Saturday nights when the nurses would wheel patients who were well enough out onto a patio for fresh air. The nurses would turn on music and dance.

When it was time to go home the doctor told her mother […]

Movement Beats PolioMaggie Downie2017-10-25T15:49:42-04:00

Movement is Maintenance

Body vs. Machine

Your body is not your car. You can bring it in for regular checkups, but you can’t replace the parts anytime you want. And if you need to and the part is available, it might be VERY, VERY expensive.

So do some regular maintenance (code for movement) and help your body feel better and last longer.

Movement is MaintenanceMaggie Downie2017-10-25T15:49:42-04:00

Chill Out for Better Results…It’s Not All or Nothing

The barefoot running movement got a pretty bad reputation because anecdotally lots of people got hurt barefoot running. If I got seriously injured doing something I attempted to do for my health, I’d stop too. If I loved running before I altered the way I did it and hated it now, I go back to my old ways. It makes sense.

One of my friends tore both his Achilles tendons running with minimalist shoes. But what he did and what many barefoot runners did was push too much too fast. The barefoot running movement and the makers of minimalist shoes all said if you want to make this change you have to start slow—really slow. Go too fast and you’ll get hurt. Taking on more than we are ready for is a major reason people new to exercise stop moving. They work too hard in a hope to get quick results, get hurt and don’t want to continue. Some people associate exercise with pain and getting hurt. That’s always been their experience. Moving doesn’t have to hurt, and should NEVER hurt in a “bad” way. The concept of no pain no gain has been disproved, but it is a really hard […]

Chill Out for Better Results…It’s Not All or NothingMaggie Downie2017-10-25T15:49:49-04:00

89-Year-Old Grandma Crawls Inside Igloo

My Grandma turned 89 in February. A couple months ago we went shopping for a new pair of slippers. She balanced on one foot while untying her shoe, slid her foot out of her shoe and into the slipper. She may have held my hand through the process, but her balance was impeccable. And this is a woman who had polio as a child. Her legs are two different lengths. There was a point in her life when all her leg muscles had atrophied after spending months strapped to a wooden board, immobilized.

Ruth at 89 outside the Igloo

Still, it came as no surprise when she announced that for her 89^th birthday she wanted to see the igloo we had built, and she even wanted to go inside. You had to crawl to get in. My mom suggested we could lay down a tarp and pull her in if Ruth inside the igloo!

she couldn’t get in on her own. I’m not sure when something turns from fun game with Grandma to elder […]

89-Year-Old Grandma Crawls Inside IglooMaggie Downie2017-10-25T15:59:36-04:00

Does Movement Feel Good?

When was the last time you went to a fitness class and it felt good? Hopefully, the answer is, “Yesterday, I love the way my (insert class name here) feels every week.” I hope you thought that. I’m with you. I love to move. Throw me in almost any type of class and I’m going to enjoy it. I’m happy in motion, probably to a fault. But even when it feels good to move, it’s not always fun.

There is a free, silliness to movement that we tend not to hold onto as we age. It’s been drilled out of us. I watch my friend’s kids giggling over summersaults. They will spin in circles until they collapse in a heap. I’m not advocating circle spinning. The thought of doing that now makes me nauseous. The last time a rolled down a hill (about a decade ago) I learned that it is more torture than fun in my body. Things change. But kids get so much joy out of motion, and half the moves are concocted, on a whim and beyond goofy looking. They don’t care.

I saw the video of this little girl, who was clearly enjoying herself dancing to a different beat […]

Does Movement Feel Good?Maggie Downie2017-10-25T15:49:42-04:00