Common health conditions partially treated and controlled by exercise

• Allergies: Exercise is on of the body’s most efficient ways to control nasal congestion (and the accompanying discomfort of restricted nasal blood flow).
• Angina: Regular aerobic exercise dilates vessels, increasing blood flow-thereby improving the body’s ability to extract oxygen from the blood stream.
• Anxiety: Exercise triggers the release of mood-altering chemicals in the brain.
• Arthritis: By forcing a skeletal joint to move, exercise induces the manufacture of synovial fluid, helps to distribute it over the cartilage and forces it circulate through-out the joint space.
• Back Pain: Exercise helps to both strengthen the abdominal muscles and the lower back extensor muscles and stretch the hamstring muscles.
• Bursitis and Tendonitis: Exercise can strengthen the tendons-enabling t hem to handle greater loads without being injured.
• Cancer: Exercise helps maintain ideal body weight and helps keep body fat to a minimum.
• Carpal Tunnel Syndrome: Exercise helps build up the muscles in the wrists and forearms-thereby reducing the stress on arms, elbows and hands.
• Cholesterol: Exercise helps raise HDL (the good cholesterol) levels in the blood and lower LDL (the undesirable lipoprotein) levels.
• Constipation: Exercise helps strengthen the abdominal muscles, thereby making it easier to release waists.
• Depression: Exercise helps speed metabolism and deliver more oxygen to the brain; the improved level of circulation in the brain tends to enhance your mood.
• Diabetes: Exercise helps lower excess blood sugar levels, strengthen muscles and heart, improve circulation, and reduce stress.
• Fatigue: Exercise can help alleviate the fatigue-causing effects of stress, poor circulation and blood oxygenation, bad posture, and poor breathing habits.
• Glaucoma: Exercise helps relieve intraocular hypertension- the pressure buildup on the eyeball that heralds the onset of glaucoma.
• Headaches: Exercise helps force the brain to secrete more of the body’s opiate-like, pain-dampening chemicals (e.g., endorphins and enkephalins).
• Heart Disease:Exercise helps promote many changes that collectively lower the risk of heart disease-a decrease in body fat, a decrease in LDL, an increase in the efficiency of the heart and lungs, a decrease in blood pressure and a lowered heart rate.
• High Blood Pressure: Exercise reduces the level of stress-related chemicals in the blood stream that constrict the arteries and veins, increases the release of endorphins, raise the level of HDL in the bloodstream, lowers resting heart rate, and helps reduce blood pressure through body weight maintenance.
• Insomnia: Exercise helps reduce muscular tension and stress.
• Intermittent Claudication: Exercise helps improve peripheral circulation and increases pain tolerance.
• Knee Problems: Exercise helps strengthen the structures attendant to the knee-muscles, tendons and ligaments-thereby facilitating the ability of the knee to withstand stress.
• Lung Disease: Exercise helps strengthen the muscles associated with breathing and helps boost the oxygen level in the blood.
• Memory Problems: Exercise helps to improve cognitive ability by increasing the blood and oxygen flow to the brain.
• Menstrual Problems and PMS: Exercise helps to control the  hormonal imbalances often associated with PMS by increasing the release of beta-endorphins.
• Osteoporosis: Exercise promotes bone density-thereby lowering an individual’s risk of suffering a bone fracture.
• Overweight Problems: Exercise is an appetite suppressant. It also increases metabolic rate, burns fat, increases lean muscle mass and improves self-esteem.
• Varicose Veins: Exercise can help control the level of discomfort cause by existing varicose veins and help preven getting additional varicose veins.

Now ask yourself, are the positive effects that result from regular exercise worth the effort? Absolutely. But it’s all about making time for your body’s health because sooner or later, you will be asking your body to make time for you. I personally would prefer later than sooner…