Question
Dear David,
thank you so much for your response';'it warmed my heart and gave me hope again'';'; my problem is the incredible fear of death i  suffer from  and as the years tick by i am getting more and more scared the the ultimate journey';'; your attitude really lifted me up and gave me wings';';thank you';';it has been an honour talking via the net to you';';i would love to talk to you via messenger if you have one''; if so pleose add me mine is [email protected]';;' looking forward to hearing from you

hugs helen
Followup To
Question -
-I would love to know about the weight bearing excercises
this "getting older," is not good for us" "lol,"
maybe i need to put some arch supports in my shoes.
DO you feel old? and does that thought  worry you?
The years just seem to have swished  by ';';one minute i was 19 next im nearly 52';';sigh';';
thank you for your time
hugs Helen------------------------
Followup To
Question -
first let me

thank you for your help
i have been walking for many years now but in the last few months i have changed from walking on flat land to hilly terrain';';now my left calf is burning and feels strange and my legs feel week
i walk for 2 hours at night';';i am 52 year old  and i wake every morning in the last few months with really stiff achilles tendons and the bottom of my feet burn and it feels like i am treading on pebbles when i put my foot on the ground
no swelling just this burning aching weak  feeling in calves and hot burnt stinging feet
my achilles and heels really ache and feel stiff and electrified
what could be causing this
i do not have diebettes
thank you once again
Answer -
Hello Helen

Well, the bad news is; you are getting older. When ALL of US! get older, our muscles get stiffer. Interesting, I cannot find anyone who can tell me WHY our muscles get stiffer when we get older.

Stiff muscles have poor circulation. That causes the pain you describe.

So what to do?

Here is what I have been doing:

I stand in my kitchen, at the counter top. Hands on the counter top for balance, I slowly squat down, and then up. 10 times. I then step back a bit, and do 10 counter top pushups. I then lunge one knee forward and back, 10 times, then the other leg. I set on foot back and move forward, stretching the calf muscle. I do this 10 times, then I do the other leg. Finally, I stand, facing a wall, arms straight up. I move one knee forward, pressing it against the wall. The opposite leg has the foot firmly back, on the floor. I press my body and face against the wall, strongly stretching the calf on the opposite leg as well as the shoulders and arms. I do this two times for each foot.

I do not do these exercises all together. I take pauses between each exercise. Easier on the body.

I do these exercises every day.

I also have arch supports, plastic, in my shoes, that I purchased on the internet. Really helps the arch muscle.

I also do weightlifting exercises to make my legs and feet stronger. If you want to discuss these exercise also, please write again.

Thanks for the question. Hope this helps!


Answer -
Hello Again Helen

I love follow-up questions. That means I gave some real help. So many times I write wonderful and thoughtful solutions to problems people have, especially parents with children and their physical problems, never to hear anything from them again! So thanks, for writing back.

Now, let's talk about age. My son put my on his friends site called MySpace. It is thousands of kids and teenagers that talk to each other. One teener asked me if I regretted being "an old man" (I am age 53, almost age 54).

I told him, NO, I have had over 50 years of listening to rock and roll music. You, on the other hand, have had only the opportunity to listen to a small amount of music, and only recent music. I have had heard everything, from rock, to pop, to hiphop, to metal. I got a FLOOD of replies from a lot of kids that thought my answer was great!

When I was 19, I was a 6'2" kid that weighed 185 pounds. I wore a medium shirt, and I had a 35" waist.

When I turned age 35, I panicked! I thought, "my God, I will be 40 in 5 years!" "I better do something, anything, because my life will be over when I turn 40..."

SO I bought a book on weightlifting. I do not remember the title, but Arnold Schwarznegger wrote it. And it was weightlifting for women. The only book the store sold.
I also bought a 120-pound set of weight plates that were plastic with concrete poured into them. THAT was the beginning of changing my life.

As the years went by, I tried all kinds of exercises, read books, read magazines, wrote to people who weightlifted, and learned and CHANGED my body.

Now I am age 53, almost age 54. I now wear a 4XL SHIRT, I weigh 273 pounds, I have 14% bodyfat, I get p[hysicals every 3 months, and the doctors are amazed as to the physical shape I am in. People around me are also amazed, too. I look forward to, with excitement, the next 70 years. Will I reach 120? Who knows, but at least I will work toward reaching it.

Look at it this way. In the last 15 years, we have had a FLOOD of new inventions, new things that make our lives better, happier. Take computers! It was not that long ago I did not have one. Now I can learn about the entire world.
What a difference in my life, from age 19, until now. We did not even have air conditioning then!

Now, to strength-building exercises:

The easiest one I tell everyone is this:

Go to Home Depot and buy a couple of 5-gallon pails with lids. Fill them both up with some water. Pick them up off the floor. Elbows bent, knees bent, bend over a bit. HOLD them both for 60 seconds. Use a clock with a sweep second hand to watch the time. Every other day, do this exercise.

By keeping your joints bent, your muscles hold the weight, not your bones.

What this does: it fatiques the muscles. The msucles and bones respond by getting stronger. Once a week, add a little bit more water.

REALLY consider the arch supports. Arch mucles DO NOT stretch. You pull them, and the pain is unreal. Avoid the pain, get the supports.

More about attitude. As we get older, the metabolism slows down. Our bodies makes chemicals that make us happy. As the meteabolism slows down, we get depressed and upset. Especially at OUR age! By doing my daily exercises, my metabolism is always UP, higher than even when I was a teenager. I feel like I felt when I was 4-5 years old. I guess the word is "giddy?" Every day I wake up, want to crawl back into bed, do my aerobics to wake up, and more exercises all day long, and the entire day and evening, I am literally in HIGH GEAR with my emotions. I get only 5 hours of sleep a night, that is all I need. I fall asleep immediately. Trouble is, when asleep, everything slows down, so when I wake up, the upset and depressed feelings return again. So I push myself out of bed, do the exercises, and rev myself up for another day.

Wish I did NOT have to exercise. But I enjoy how I feel afterwards. I would rather face my future happy and STRONG, than a physical wreck.

PS Consider buying a power rack, a standard bar and some weight plates. I can give you an exercise with these that will change your entire body for the better for the rest of your life.

AND PPS; If you have any more concerns, questions, etc. write again. I have been THRU IT ALL in life. Good and bad. And I am STILLLL HERE!

To your good health.

Answer
Hello again!

Let's start with your fear of death.

A loooonnggggg time ago some people wrote stories that were combined into a book called the Bible. Let's face it, these people had NO technology, no machines. Just words and ideas.
One person wrote "in the beginning." How would they know that?

In the beginning, God created the heavens, the stars, etc., etc. - EVERYTHING OUT IN SPACE. These people did not have any way to know that everything was created at once.

Along comes a man about 52 years ago and says; everything in the universe was created instantly, in the form of a big bang. Yea, right!

Then NASA last year sent a probe into space and found POSITIVE SCIENTIFIC PROOF that everthing DID start with a big bang! Everything; the stars, the planets, earth, you, me - everything!

So, how could people thousands of years ago know this? And, why is it what they said and wrote, we now know to be true?

Next, death. I read a book by a doctor who works in a hospital dealing with sick children. All the children who died, no matter what age, who then came back thanks to modern medical science, later described the same thing;

They floated in the air above their bodies. They could describe in detail what the doctors and nurses said and did.

A light appeared above them, bright white. They came toward it. People that they once knew where in the light.

They suddenly were pulled back down to their bodies where they then woke up.

Dozens of children said this. Different ages, different religions, many with no religions. Back to the bible; it talks about all of us having a soul. Again, we cannot see it; it is like air. We cannot see air, we feel it. But we cannot see it. So why would people a long time ago talk about souls? One day we will figure out how to measure souls, probably pure energy. But for now, one doctor is saying that there is definitely something happening when children die. Remember the guy who said everything started with a big bang? He got a lot of scoffing and arguments too.
Same as the doctor who wrote the book now.

Even more to think about: we are all made of the same stuff that everything in the universe is made of! We call it atoms and molecules. But atoms and molecules are not alive! But we are. Adults who died, and came back, said they met with people who say our souls are powering our bodies. When the bodies die, the souls leave the bodies and go somewhere else. The bible says where; I believe eventually science will prove where we go.

So, we know our bodies are electrical and chemical machines. We know that they need exercise to stay healthy and strong.
We know that if they do not get exercise, we get weak and unhappy. And we THINK that life is a soul of probably some form of energy that goes SOMEWHERE else. If we go to that "place somewhere else," I would like to go looking as well as I possibly can. Perhaps I will meet some of the people I helped over the years on AllExperts.

PS I stopped using my email. Someone took my email address, starting writing to others and sending them viruses to their computers. Even wrote to various travel chat sites and told them about places I enjoyed going to. Huh? I never went to any of these places, but it had my email address and name.

Any more questions, as always, write. Have a great week.