Laid low by lassitude

The last few months I have been laid low by two bad chest infections.  Three courses of antibiotics managed to keep me out of hospital.  However during much of this time I was afflicted by severe lassitude; it was an effort to do even minor things.  Until the last fortnight or so, I had no energy for exercise, so I am extremely unfit.  Walking a short distance is quite a triumph. 

It seems to be generally agreed that most patients with heart failure benefit from exercise, and indeed it is, with medication and healthy eating, considered an important part of treatment.  There is a helpful chapter on exercise in the excellent book “Living well with heart failure” by Kasper and Knudson.  They point out that it is desirable to carry out varied exercises as well as the standard advice to walk for half an hour or so regularly.  Over the years I have devised many exercise programmes which were fine, but ultimately too ambitious, as I gave up before there was much chance for them to do me any good.   I hope I am now more realistic, time will tell.  I plan to spend some twenty minutes, say five mornings a week.   Start with  warm up (marching, heel raising, stretching, wobble board or standing on one leg etc), deep breathing, sit/stands from a chair for four minutes,  wall press-ups for two minutes, biceps curls with a medium rubber band for two minutes, and a gentle cool down with more dreaded stretches.  Perhaps, in the fullness of time,  I could add abdominal crunches, wrist and back exercises, stepping up and down on a stair – the possibilities are endless.  For the moment I plan to keep it simple: twenty minutes of morning exercises, plus walking.    Watch this space.