How Diabetes is Helped by Brisk Walking

Images Dawn

First and foremost, brisk walking helps you lose weight effectively. And losing weight is a big step to controlling your blood sugar levels if you are diabetic. After your medical doctor approves of your brisk walking workout, do it regularly at least 30 to 45 minutes a day with proper diet.

Brisk walking helps shrink dangerous abdominal fats that increase the risk of diabetes. The excess fat building up around your waist and abdomen can lead to inflammation in your cells which can result to your being resistant to insulin---a hormone controlling sugar levels in the blood.

A Canadian study in fact discovered that women who did brisk walking for an hour or so each day lessened their abdominal fat by 20 percent after just 14 weeks or 3 and a half months---even without changing their eating habits.

"Walking is one of the best types of 'medicine' we have to help prevent diabetes, or reduce its severity and potential complications—such as heart attack and stroke—if you already have it," states JoAnn Manson, MD, DrPH, in an article on the site Prevention. She is also chief of the division of preventive medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, at the same time a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School.

My cousin, Ismael, goes biking regularly to keep his blood sugar levels normal. According to him, it works, requiring him less medications. But brisk walking is better than biking because with biking you have more idling time, like when you stop pedaling because the bike keeps moving on via the momentum anyway, especially downhill. 

With brisk walking, you have to keep your legs working, uphill or downhill. 

My friend and shooting range buddy, Lito, who's also a diabetic, jogs regularly at UP Diliman and says he gets wonderfully normal blood sugar levels after such runs. "It's like I'm not diabetic at all!" he exclaims.

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