What Exercise to do if you have IBS

We all know that we should exercise, that it will keep us healthy, that it will prolong our lives and improve the quality of our life. But many people do very little or nothing, while others are sporadic in their efforts to get fit. They go all out for a few weeks, maybe even months and then something happens that makes it too hard and they quit, while promising themselves that they will get back to it when this hurdle has been overcome. A small percentage exercise on a regular basis over the years and decades.

You have IBS and you can’t afford to make excuses not to exercise. I have heard it all in my phone calls with clients and prospective clients. They feel too ill, they have no energy, they are too busy. And the excuses go on. But the fact is that nothing will change unless you change something. It won’t happen all by itself. You will never feel well if you don’t exercise, you will never have any energy if you don’t exercise, and the excuse about having no time is so old that it makes me yawn. Everyone has the time to get well. When you are well, you will have all the time in the world. Your health comes first, second and third, and exercise is a part of that.

My video spells out why you need to exercise if you have IBS and what form of exercise is the best.

Exercise and IBS

We all know that we need to exercise. Whether we do or not is a different matter. Exercise helps decrease your possibility of having a heart attack or stroke. It also helps with high blood pressure, arthritis, diabetes, numerous things. What it is really good for is that it’s a mood enhancer because it helps release those chemicals in the brain that we need to regulate our moods. If you’re feeling down or a bit melancholic, go out and do some exercise. It will make a world of difference.

Exercise also reduces stress because of the endorphins that are released. By reducing stress, your colon can relax and we know that stress irritates our colon. Get that to relax and that’s going to help everything as well.

While you’re exercising, the blood is flowing around your body much more freely. Your heart beat is higher so the blood is flowing mainly because it needs to get to those extremities that are doing the work, but it also increases the blood flow to the digestive system which helps it to move properly. Especially if you have constipation, we need to get that body moving to help the motility in the colon because part of the problem with constipation is that it’s moving so sluggishly.

That’s why we should exercise. But what sort of exercise should we do? They say that it’s best not to do the high impact type of exercise like for example, pole vaulting or jumping through mountains. Anything that has the body going up and landing with an impact which jolts your internal organs.

As we know, our colon hates to be annoyed or it gets all traumatic about it. Let’s not annoy our colon and make it leap around inside our body. Exercises that you could do would be walking, swimming, cycling – 20 to 30 minutes a day. Every day is great, but you can have a day off. They often actually advise you to have a day off. But the more you can exercise and if you can do it longer, the better. Your general health will improve and so will your digestive health.

You can also do yoga, Pilates, golf because that’s mainly walking, Tai Chi. Any of those gentle sports or exercises that are beneficial but that don’t jolt your intestines around. It’s not enough to know this, you have to do it, actually start doing it. It will become a habit, but it does take time. For something like exercise and when you haven’t been exercising, it can take as long as a month for it to become a habit. You have to persevere for a month for it to become something that then you will feel wrong if you don’t do and that’s the point you want to get to. To the point where if you skip your exercise one day, you actually feel bad about that because a habit has been broken. But it does take a while to form that habit, so persevere. If you find it hard, that’s the time to knuckle down and really get on with it. As they say, “When the going gets tough, the tough get going.” That’s what you have to do. Stick to it. It will become a routine, and certainly your digestive system will be very, very pleased about that.