Over the past month, many Widowed Friends members attended a couple of walking groups and a balance workshop at Live Well Exercise Clinic in Oakville.
Live Well Exercise Clinic is a supervised exercise and behaviour change organization. Their team comprises kinesiologists, trainers and clinical exercise physiologists who create programs for their members based on fitness level, strengths, goals and medical history. It is a fun, welcoming and judgement-free space, perfect for anyone who wants to establish an exercise routine or stay in shape.
We are very grateful to Kira and the team at Live Well for hosting our members and for the great information and advice she offered the group.
The first week walking group attendees toured around the beautiful Bronte neighbourhood in Oakville. Unfortunately, the temperatures soared that day and the 30+ degree weather shortened the walk due to the extreme heat.
Our second week, the weather co-operated and we walked for about 45 minutes around Bronte neighbourhoods and then down to the Bronte harbour area with brilliant sun and cool winds helping us along. Following the walks, Kira led a stretching cool down, so the group left feeling refreshed and ready for the rest of their day.
Our last event was a workshop on balance. Many of us find that our ability to balance declines as we age and that can have major impacts on our day to day safety and ability to avoid falls.
Kira first outlined what physical processes comprise balance and all the different components that can affect 
our abilities. Then we broke into smaller groups and tried out a few balancing exercises using Live Well’s equipment to learn a few techniques to use at home daily to help improve our balance.
She emphasized that a program targeted to improve balance should be multifaceted and progressive and should include strength training especially of legs and core, should be increasingly challenging and test our sensory feedback pathways as well (the internal processes that help guide us to remain balanced).
Live Well is happy to provide free consultations with anyone who has questions about their programs or on how to improve their physical fitness. You can contact Kira at info@oakville.livewellclinic.ca for more information about their programs.
