After last week’s article about the 11 Steps to Personal Energy, a friend of mine reminded me that there is an all important Twelfth Step which I inadvertently left out. I should have known better because it was one of my original fifteen Steps of Personal Energy.
Of course the 12th step is Rest, Sleep and Recovery.
This article is an overview, not a detailed “report” on the topic. The principles are simple but apply in different ways to different people. Some people need more rest and sleep while others need less. Some preach that seniors need less sleep than younger people, other say the opposite.
Here are some basic principles of rest, sleep and recovery.
- Your muscles grow and rebuild during rest rather than during exercise.
- As a senior, you need more rest between exercise sessions to recover from strenuous resistance exercises. The norm is 24 to 48 hours of rest and recovery. I have seen recommendations for as much as 72 hours to recover from resistance exercise. Lighter exercises don’t require as much recovery time.
- The more vigorous the exercise, the longer the rest and recovery period until you become “acclimated” to the exertion. Different people need different recovery periods based on their own individual needs. When you first start to exercise, it will take longer to recover. As you get used to exercise, the period in between sessions may shorten. Seniors need more rest between sessions.
- You body will speak to you and tell you if you need more time to recover. But if you become over-zealous, you many not notice what your body is saying — or you won’t listen.
How about sleep? Your body needs sound sleep to maintain energy. Experts tell us that seniors need between seven and nine hours of uninterrupted sleep each night. That’s difficult to do as we get older. I can’t speak for the ladies but most of the men I surveyed said that they get up once or twice (or more) times during the night to use the bathroom.
The natural human rhythm is to sleep when he sun goes down and get up when the sun comes up. Some of us come close in the Summer during Daylight Savings Time, but for most of the year, the lure of the “blue light” (video screens) is too much of an attraction for early bedtimes.
If some of this sounds vague, that’s because, like nutrition, there are many varied opinions on the subject of rest and sleep. There is no “one size fits all” rule. So what’s best? Whatever works best for you. We are all responsible for listening to, understanding, and then acting on the feedback we get from our bodies. While the basic fundamentals above apply to most of us, we are all different and have different needs.
You own body should give you the best answers.
Thank you for reading.