Gardening As Part of a Healthy Lifestyle

As a health guide here at myhealthvillage I often discuss various exercise and eating behaviors with my clients to promote a healthy lifestyle. It occurred to me that during several seasons of the year, I have my own exercise program right outside in my yard. It’s my garden, well actually, my whole family’s garden.

In addition to the exercise benefit, we can improve our diet with fresh vegetables that are free from harmful pesticides and get better tasting produce than we get from the grocer. Foods that have to be shipped long distances are often not picked at peak flavor, and sometimes the varieties are not the tastiest either.

I like to get out in the garden as soon as I can in the morning on my days off or later in the evening when it’s not so hot here in Missouri. I generally put on sunscreen, a sweat band and often a garden hat. I have knee pads or a knee cushion I sometimes use for planting sets or other work close to the ground. Garden gloves are a must for me, and I treat myself to a new pair every year to add to my supply of a half dozen or so.

I have chronic, intermittent back pain that I’ve talked to my doctor about, so I am careful to use good body mechanics and not lift anything the wrong way or bend over for too long at a time. The knee pads help. Unfortunately we don’t mulch our garden to cut down on the weeds, so this means pulling them, tilling or using an old-fashioned hoe. My husband sometimes uses his fancy Italian tiller to go between the rows, but I’ve done plenty of weed pulling after our frequent spring rains. That’s the best time, if you can avoid getting mud up to your ankles. I’ve had some serious and vigorous workouts using the hoe. Keeping ahead of the weeds is a major goal every year that we don’t usually achieve. However, we manage to get plenty of vegetables anyway.

This year we hope to have plenty of tomatoes, green peppers, cucumbers and zucchini squash. The eggplants don’t look too sturdy, and the kale didn’t germinate too well, but we still have hope we’ll get a modest crop of those two very healthy veggies.

So if you have the time and the space, consider gardening as part of your healthy lifestyle. You’ll get great exercise and healthy food for your table.