Benefits of Exercise - Osteoporosis

Photo by Owen Beard Unsplash

As we get older, our bodies go through a whole lot of changes. One of the negative effects of aging is osteoporosis. This condition tends to make us more frail and prone to injury. If our bones are weaker, movement becomes a higher risk. Falling can also be a problem, and we'll deal with the effects of resistance training on balance in the future. But, with weaker bones, a lack of balance that leads to a fall increases the probability that bones will break.

Let's take a look at how resistance training can help to reduce the risks from osteoporosis so that we can live longer, happier, more full lives as we continue to age. If you are still relatively young, perhaps young enough that such things seem like a lifetime away, you should probably be paying attention to this anyway. As with investing your money for retirement, the best time to do it was years ago and the second best time to do it is today.

So, bone density is similar. The best time to address aging bone density reduction, and therefore frailty, is when you are young. The second best time to address it is right now! The primary process that is going to help us with protecting us from this situation is a big fancy word; homeostasis.

Homeostasis is simply the concept that the human body likes to maintain a certain level of consistency. We see this work in various ways during our normal activity. For example, on a hot day, the body "detects" that core temperature is rising, therefore it kicks in systems to help reduce body temperature, such as sweating. When performing tasks requiring exertion, the body "detects" that more oxygen is being used by the muscles, therefore depleting normal oxygen stores. It then responds by increasing your rate of breathing in order to provide more oxygen to the system to keep oxygen levels stable.

When it comes to bone density and strength, how does this homeostasis related? The more inactive we are, the more our bodies will deplete resources such as bone or muscle. These tissues have to be maintained by the body and that maintenance "costs" the body a certain amount of energy. If there is no reason to continue to maintain the current bone density or muscle composition, the body will allow those things to decrease so that it does not have to maintain tissues that are not required.

By practicing regular resistance training, you are putting a load on your skeletal system which triggers to body to recognize that, in order to maintain homeostasis, a certain amount of bone density and strength is required to handle such loads. This causes the body to avoid depleting bones because it no longer sees bone density as an unnecessary biological expense. If you begin this training while still in your 20's or 30's, the effects of such training carry over for quite a long time even if you stop training after a period of time.

That's not all, though. One of the side-effects of the bodies attempt to maintain homeostasis is something often referred to as "overcompensation." Let's go back to a financial example in order to set up this idea.

Let's take a typical American family with a house, 2.5 children and a dog. Regardless of whether or not they do, in fact, have a white picket fence in the front yard, there is a pretty good chance that they have a refrigerator. In our hypothetical situation, let's imagine that the fridge goes on the fritz. Now, they will have to spend money to either fix or replace it. If you've ever gone searching for a new refrigerator, you will know that they can get quite expensive. So, after they shell out gobs of $$ to get a new fridge, the family decides that they need to save enough money so that, if something like this happens again, they will be prepared. In fact, they decide to save even more than what this refrigerator cost, because they realize that it could be even more expensive next time.

This is not unlike what happens with the human body. When regularly subjected to heavy loads, such as with barbell resistance training, the body recognizes that reducing bone density is not a good way to maintain homeostasis. Further, the body will also recognize that, if these loads keep being introduced and the body is to keep up with being able to support these weights, it may just have to increase bone density as a way of overcompensating for the imposed loads in order to ensure that the bones have more than enough strength and density to handle the load without damage (injury).

Of course, the older you are, the more slowly this process works. However, the process still works. If you are an octogenarian and have to use a walker to help you move around, and that is not a result of a previous injury or medical issue (in other words...it's just due to bone and muscle loss as a result of lack of use over time), you can actually recoup bone density (and muscle mass, but we'll get to that another time) and protect yourself from injury as well as increase the strength of your skeletal system so that you are able to support your own weight and, eventually, in many situations, ditch the walker.

Therefore, no matter how young or old you are, if you want to have the best chance of being more independent as you age, start training now. If you want your best chance of becoming more independent at a currently advanced age, start training now. The body has a miraculous ability to adapt to whatever we throw at it. By training with resistance, you stimulate the body, and all it's systems, to become stronger which helps you to perform normal daily functions with relative ease compared to those who do not train. 

It's never too early and, as long as you're still breathing, it's never too late. Your medical condition and injury history, of course, can affect how much of an impact training will have on your situation. But there is no downside to a safe, guided, well-formed resistance training program. If you want to give yourself the best chance of keeping (or recovering) independence and mobility, feel free to get ahold of me and we'll get you everything you need to become stronger and less fragile as age attempts to take those things away from you.