Fitness and exercise are not the first thing you think will be main focus when going through the experience of cancer and, in reality, definitely isn’t either. It’s quite obviously difficult to achieve when you are going through the toughest time of your life.
You will be under so much physical stress, but also mental stress and one thing that helps with that is exercise. Sometimes you be too unwell to do anything however on the less bad days, doing any kind of movement you can, helps. Even if it’s not more than 5 minutes, but it knocks you out and makes you have a better more restful sleep, it’s still doing something good to your body!
I really struggled in the first 2 months, in hospital, with the feeling of my body wasting away. I could literally feel every muscle and bone weakening and shrinking. I became so stiff I was in pain after sitting in one position too long, and this lasted months. I really hated not being the same as I have always been and noticing changes physically to your body was really heart breaking.
For some time, in the first stint in hospital, I could barely walk anywhere. I don’t know if it was a reaction to all the drugs I was on or just severe anxiety from such a drastic change of circumstances, but I could barely feel my body and it felt so weightless and weak. One day I passed out on the way back from the bathroom and from that moment for about a week, I could barely get out of bed and needed escorting to the bathroom as I had absolutely no confidence that I could even carry myself. The massive change I saw in myself was so upsetting and at this stage, with this happening within the first few weeks it was so overwhelming too. I couldn’t really see the end at that point, and I didn’t really have a clue what to do about it.
I badly missed the intense spin classes I used to go, yoga classes and running on the moors near my house. It was hard to just throw all that out of the window and accept my new reality. My boyfriend bought me a yoga mat, when I was first diagnosed, for the hospital. At the beginning, I tried to force myself to do a bit of yoga each day, however, I soon found out with the intensity of the treatment, this was near impossible. I learnt to put exercise to the back of mind and if one day I felt well enough, it was a nice treat to move around a bit.
I am writing this, 5 months on and 3 rounds of chemotherapy and immunotherapy later and can’t even believe the changes already. Even though I have so much more treatment to go, I currently would consider myself (nearly) normal. I recovered from my second round of chemotherapy relatively quickly as it had blasted nearly all the leukaemia that was in my body. After a week of being at home I was going on 1-2 hour walks, doing full yoga sessions at home and even went on a 10minute run one day! A few weeks after that, all the stiffness I was suffering from ceased and I felt there really wasn’t anything bad happening to my body anymore. I have since managed a 4k run which I was so proud of myself for doing and thoroughly enjoyed myself – despite the fact I was in agony for days as my muscles seemed to be very shocked at doing so much exercise.
As I am due a stem cell transplant at some point, I am totally aware that I will be back to square one in the coming months. I am still a bit blind about the whole stem cell transplant thing, but I do know it will be the worst thing I’ve gone through yet and recovering from a stem cell transplant it a totally different ball game to recovering from chemotherapy.
For now, though, I love doing exercise and I love feeling my body getting stronger and it gives me confidence I will be stronger to tackle the transplant. However, I still accept the fact I can’t push myself and I still have to take things slow as I am not what I used to be and just simply enjoy the fact I am moving again. I know I could definitely do more with my fitness, however, as a cancer patient you still have to keep a balance and prioritise. When you start to include hospital visits, treatment and social events, it starts to take all your time and energy up. And having a good time socialising with friends or family or having nice days out is just as, if not more important than keeping fit, at this stage.
Exercise Tips
When in hospital, undergoing chemotherapy
Sometimes just simply sitting on your mat/ in bed doing gentle stretches and movements is beneficial. I usually stayed on the ground just doing seated or lying down exercises and only a handful of times did I feel strong enough to stand up for poses. Here are some examples:
· Roll around wrists, ankles, neck.
· Lie on your back pull your knees to chest and stretch legs.
· Lie and back and do some gentle twists.
When you have just arrived home from weeks in hospital
· Start by walking, see if you can do 20minutes then either continue this a few times a week or build up to 30.
· Start doing gentle yoga at home. I use YouTube for a guided yoga session and a particular favourite channel of mine is Yoga with Adrienne. She has such a wide range of sessions for all abilities and had such a nice way of delivering the practice. Although I haven’t myself used them yet as I am a bit set in my ways of what I already do, I know Trekstock have some really good yoga video classes that are highly recommended, specified for people with or recovering from or going through cancer.
When you have had a while off treatment or are feeling stronger in yourself
· Going for longer walks with more hills, helps build up movement, stamina and general fitness.
· Starting to run, if this is something you enjoy. I started going round the block for 10minutes with breaks in between. I didn’t like going far at this point just in case something happened and I wasn’t ready but I was completely fine, but something you might consider.
· Build up the running but stay somewhere flat as hills really knock you out. I found I felt better from just running for as long as I could rather than pushing myself with difficult routes. Also take a running partner!
· If you aren’t neutropenic a yoga class is great idea! Unlike other gym classes, yoga is great as the teachers encourage you to take it at your own pace and there is no pressure to compare yourself to others or to keep going. It is totally up to you how you manage your session. I managed to get to a Trekstock meet up where I met other people that have or have had cancer and we started off with an amazing reggae yoga class, lead by Cariad Yoga, then coffee and a cake afterwards!
