Fitness in Life

By: Andy Matthews

I want to encourage adults and parents out there to get fit. Whether you have hemophilia yourself, or you have a child with hemophilia, fitness is an important part of a healthy lifestyle. I have always been passionate about fitness and I guess it goes back to the fact that I could not play sports when I was growing up in the 70’s because of my hemophilia, so I wanted to at least “look the part” and be stronger than my friends to help my self-esteem (and also maybe so they wouldn’t think I was weird because I couldn’t play sports.) Even if I wasn’t allowed to play sports, at least I was strong and fit.

It all started with swimming and biking for me. My dad got me a bike when I was about three years old and from then on I was “bike crazy.” I truly believe it helped me to not develop a target knee, because it kept my knees in such good shape. I am 43 years old with severe factor 8 deficiency and was not on prophylaxis until I was an adult, but instead was only on Cryoprecipitate on demand until I was 18 years old. I truly see my body as a miracle with the very few bad joints I have today. My one ankle is my only target joint and both swimming and biking have helped to strengthen it.

In my opinion it is best to focus on low impact strengthening exercises to build your muscles. Remember, if you have hemophilia, a strong muscle bleeds less and heels faster than a weak one! With the triple H’s, (Hemophilia, Hepatitis and HIV) it has truly saved my life to stay fit. I can still leave most of my friends who don’t have any health issues in the dust on the mountain bike trails. As an adult, I would encourage you to really build up the good joints you have. Everybody has specific issues and the important thing is keeping your joints strong.

If you are a parent, you really need to be active with your child! It will be very rare if your child is a fitness nut like I am on his own. Children learn what they see. I am already teaching my two and a half year old son about exercising; it will be a way of life for him as it is for me, and it is that much more important for a young person with a bleeding disorder. The advent of video games has really taken exercise out of kids’ daily routines, so as parents, we need to make sure they make time for it on a daily basis.

There are so many positive things that being in shape will do for someone living with a bleeding disorder. For instance, If you have HIV + or HEP C+, when you raise your heart rate, that in turn stimulates endorphins which help your immune system and will give your body a stronger foundation to work with. As my doctor always tells me good clean living has served me well. You will always see people who are co-infected do a lot better if they are in shape.

Andy’s routine exercises to keep in shape:

• At least once a week I hit the mountain bike trails for a hard ride through all types of technical stuff that challenges my whole body. This can be quite easy on all of my joints and gives me an awesome muscle and cardiovascular workout! (that is if you don’t wreck - I always wear a helmet)


• I try to hit the gym at least once or twice a week for about a 45 minute workout. My workouts consist of:


1. Lots of pull ups (awesome exercise and not hard on the joints and you get three exercises all in one.) If you can’t do pull ups, start with lat pull downs.


2. Inverted leg press machine - do high reps with low weight, 15-30 reps with about 3-4 sets. (Also it’s a great way to work your ankle and many times it is easier on it than most exercises but it is not the best if you have bad knees.)


3. Hamstring machine is also a great one and most people can do this one and not very hard on the knee at all but it will help stabilize your whole joint and will burn, burn, burn!


• I walk a lot! The best solution here is to get a dog! I have a Fox Terrier and she definitely sets the pace for me! You are your own gauge for what you can do, but I think most guys with hemophilia can walk more than they do. It’s a great way to drop weight and build muscles, and a great thing to do with your family and pets.


• Lastly, in the summer I do some swimming. It is one of the best exercises you can do for your whole body. I can’t tell you how many kids I find at camp every year that cannot swim or swim well, get your kids in swimming lessons and encourage this wonderful exercise.
  

Fitness can and should be an important part of everyone’s life, it keeps you young, healthy and can help prevent bleeds if you have hemophilia. Please take the time to make a positive influence on your children’s lives by setting a good example and exercising with them.

Hey Guys. Everyone knows you need to have good veins if you have hemophilia, but I wanted to talk to you a minute about why you really need them and how you can help make them bigger so it’s easier for you or your parents to stick you.

First of all, our veins (including mine) are our life lines. I have hemophilia too, and I value my veins like my little boy values his Hot Wheels. He has got to have his Hot Wheels or he is not having fun, and I have to have good veins in order to have fun. I treat with factor, like many of you do, every other day. So, if I want to keep my body healthy, I have got to keep getting my factor so I can keep doing the things like to do like, mountain biking, running outside with my little boy and just doing being “normal” things like all of you want to do.

Veins carry blood throughout our bodies; think of them like fast rushing rivers. Why do some rivers move quickly, while others are slow? The reason some rivers are slow is that they are too shallow and need the mud “dug out,” and when some of the mud gets moved downstream the river moves fast again.

So how do we get bigger veins? If we exercise more, that pumps more oxygen through our veins and then they grow, just like the river. Have you ever seen a person that runs a lot and has bad veins? No, they have great veins because they pump a lot of blood through their veins trying to get more oxygen to their body. Another way to have better veins is to keep your weight down and stay at a weight that is suitable for your height.

The last way to build up your veins is to build stronger muscles. Exercise is a great way to build up your muscles and your veins. Have you ever seen a body builder? They have huge veins right? That is because the more muscles you have, the more the muscles push the veins to the surface of your skin.

These are just some of the ways we can make it easier to stick ourselves. When you build better veins you will notice it hardly takes any time to infuse and it doesn’t hurt as much either. So start doing more of the things I have talked about and I promise your veins will get bigger and better! You can always ask your treatment center nurse for more ideas about building better veins and they might have some tips too. Good luck!