When was the last time that you walked in a straight line putting one foot in front of
the other. I remember as a kid, I loved walking on the curbside to test my balance. You may not
do that anymore for fun. Maybe you are afraid of falling as your muscles are not strong enough
or your reflexes are not so fast as before. Well, but there are situations in life that we must
have a good balance, like walking the dog outdoors, or putting the garbage out,
or getting the luggage out of the carousel at your next trip. So today, I will show you
balance and strength exercises that you can do at home if you have a staircase.
Before I start, let me remind you that this video is for educational purposes only
and for any individual medical advice or diagnosis or treatment, please talk to your doctor. And if
you have an emergency, go to the nearest emergency department or call 9-1-1. So what do you need? You
need an indoor staircase with railings. This one does not have railings and it's very dangerous.
This one here is curved so I don't recommend you to use this staircase. This one is good,
it has railings and a carpet floor that is no slippery. So first, I will show you 10 exercises
for healthy people. Then at the end of this video, I wil show you some adaptations that are important
for people who had a recent surgery of the knee, hip, or ankle. You may have noticed that there
are a number of cats throughout this video. Count the number of cats and enter the answer below. If
you go to the description of this video there is instructions on how you submit your answers.
So let's start. So the first exercise that we're going to do is we're going to go up on the right
foot and go down on the right foot. It's important that you have railing to do this exercise so then
you don't lose your balance. So let's do it. So all, all the way up, on the right foot. So you're
going to notice that if you do this, you are using more the muscles here in the front of the thigh.
So you get up and come down all the way down with the right foot in front. Okay? So this is
good to strengthen the front of the muscles here. And you can do this a couple of times
up and down, up and down, up and down all, on the right side. Always the right side first until you
get fatigued. So this may be two times, three, five, and you may you will notice that the more
you practice this, it will take longer for you to get fatigued. So that's the exercise number one.
So the exercise number two is the same thing but now with the left leg. So we're
going to go up and down up and down always starting with the left leg. Okay? So we go up
and try to keep your body straight.
Holding on the railing. And now we're going to come down on the left.
And again you can do this up and down a couple of times.
If you have stairs at home that's a great exercise to start your day.
So the exercise three is on side, sideways. We're not going to go all the way up we're
just going to go one step. So starting here if you feel that you're going to lose your balance,
you can hold on railing but usually this is not a problem. So on your side,
you're going to go one step and down, one step and down, and you can do this.
If you never did this you may feel tired on the side of your thighs here, so you can do 10
going up and then increase to 20. If you can do this 20 times that would be great.
So up and down. It's good for the outer muscles, it's good for the inner muscles of the time,
so that's the exercise. And the exercise number four is on the other side because now we're going
to exercise this leg. So starting here, up and down. Sto two feet together, two feet together
here and down, two feet together. Up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down. And sometimes
you need to look at where you are, but once you get used to this exercise you can look straight
and you don't even need to look at the step again. Okay? So the next exercise is backwards, we need
to exercise the glutes muscles which are usually so weak and we need to strengthen them. This is
an excellent strengthening exercise you're going to step on the first step here and you're going to
touch and come back. So we are going to do this first with the right foot so touch and come back,
touch and come back, touch and come back, touch and come back. And you do this eight times,
you can increase to twelve, twenty. Always remember you have to do this with your
sneakers or running shoes don't do this wearing socks because it can be very slippery. Okay?
So that's the exercise. And the other exercise is with the left foot. So doing the same thing
here you step on the first step and just touch the ground touch and come back, touch and come back,
touch and come back, touch and come back. Okay? Do this eight repetitions, maybe you can do twelve,
twenty. So this is a good workout on the stairs. So this exercise is also touching on the floor
with one foot but now on the side so you're going to stay only on the first
step and touch and come back, touch and come back, touch and come back,
and do this eight times. It's good because when you are touching just touching the tip of your
tiptoes on this side, it forces your other leg, the one that is up here, to be strong
and to hold your balance. That's why it's a good strengthening and balance exercise. And then this
exercise is the same thing but on the other side. So for the left leg touch and come back,
touch and come back, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and you can increase to twelve and twenty repetitions.
So the next exercise is actually stretching we're going to do the last two exercises are stretching.
We're going to stretch the plantar fascia and this muscles here on the back of our leg.
So what we're going to do is you step here on the edge of the step and just go down. You see that my
foot is going down and bending and I'm feeling all of the back of my leg is stretching and you
can go up and stretch, up and stretch and you can do this stretch, stretch, stretch, stretch, and go
up and stretch. This is good to prevent muscle cramps. Sometimes we have muscle cramps on the
back of our legs and this is an excellent exercise to prevent muscle cramps. I have another video
that you can watch about causes of muscle cramps. And the last exercise of this routine of 10
is stretching off all the muscles here on the back of the thigh the knee the back of the leg.
So you're going to use if you know if you're not used to do this you can use the second step
and try to touch your the tip of your foot here or if you can, then go on the third step,
I'll show you here, go on the third one here and then you can bend and touch your foot there and do
with both legs. So the second one or the third one. Touch the tips of your tiptoes here
and stretch, stretch, stretch. Try to also stretch all the muscles of your back, lowering your head
and then we are at the end of our 10 exercise routine. So now I'll show you how a person that
had surgery of the hip, knee, or ankle, how they go up and down stairs because that's a little
tricky because if they had surgery, this part of the body is weak and painful. So they may fall
the stairs if they don't take some precautions to go up and down. So I'll show you how to do that,
but first, don't forget to subscribe to this channel. Not a lot of people who watch my videos
subscribe to my channel, so don't forget to go now and subscribe and turn on the notifications.
So this is what we do. So if the person let's say that um this is the hip the left one is the hip
that they had operation, hip operation, knee or ankle. So we will call this the bad side.
So going upstairs you always go the first one to go is the good side so the good side always go
first remember good goals to heaven good goals up so good up bed down. So if this is the painful
or operated side, when the person is going up the stairs they will always put the good first
and they will go all the way up because the good one going up is holding all the weight
of the body. The other one is not doing a lot of things you see so it's just the one
the good one that is holding the body. So this is how they go upstairs with a good side up. So now
for the person who had a surgery let's say on this side surgery of the hip, knee, or ankle. This is
painful, this is weak. And they usually think that they have to put the good one first. That's wrong!
You put the bad, one the painful one first. It sounds counter intuitive, but this is the best
thing. And why do you do this? If you put the first one, and if you have railing or a cane
that is excellent, you put a bad one down because you see now it doesn't do a lot of things.
And what you have to do is this one goes second. So you put this one down, when you're putting
this one down this is holding your weight and this is strong, so just once you touch the step there
you can swing this one and put here. So again, you see, when I'm putting the bad one down
this is holding my body so I don't fall and fall down the stairs. And then I put this one here.
So the bad one down and always the bad goes down first
okay and it's the opposite when you're going up if you had surgery for the hip knee or ankle.
So if the person is planning to have surgery, an elective surgery of the hip,
knee, or ankle, they can start practicing these exercises going with a good leg first
up and the bad leg first down, even before the surgery because then they start reconnecting
their brain with their muscles and they practice a lot before surgery so after surgery when they come
home they already know what to do and there is very little risk of them falling down the stairs.
So here, if you had surgery of the hip, knee, or ankle, it is important to hold on the railing.
If you want to download a summary of all these exercises, there is a document that I prepared,
just go to the description of this video below and download click on the document and download
and there is a link there. Thank you for watching. Goodbye!