How Symptoms of GERD are Dramatically Diminished with Aerobic Exercise
Proper digestion requires the whole body to work.
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I have Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease, GERD. It’s sometimes called, “silent heartburn”. I once suggested that GERD may actually save my life.
I have had a persistent cough since at least 2006. I’ve tried everything I could think of to get rid of it. I have been to many doctors seeking a cure for it. And for most of those years, I didn’t even know I had GERD. I only knew that I had a persistent cough that would not respond to any medication or anything that I had tried before.
Then I happened upon a book called, “The Acid Watcher Diet”. As I read that book, I could only think, “Yeah, that’s me. That’s me, too.” And though the good doctor who wrote that book gives a very detailed analysis of the dietary changes required to get healthy again, there was one thing that he missed.
Exercise.
Maybe that’s not his field of study or medical practice. But I had noticed something months ago. I noticed that I got some relief from GERD by rebounding on a trampoline. That made me cough some. It made me burp some. I might have farted once or twice in a session, but rebounding on a trampoline made everything move. I noticed that I coughed much less after a session.
But it wasn’t enough.
Then I started to take fancy to a watch I could wear that would track my activity. I wanted something that was more accurate than my phone for tracking my steps.
I wanted something that could track my sleep, too. I’m not a very good sleeper. I sneak in naps here and there. I’m still helping my kids fall asleep. I have a book for that, but I still needed exercise. Exercise means better sleep.
So I settled on a Fitbit. My wife was not happy that I bought one without telling her. I knew that she would prefer I not spend money. But all I could think of was that I’d been living a sedentary life for so long that I began to worry that I was headed for a wheelchair.
You know, I used to work in a retirement home. I saw there that the people who were happiest were walking every day. I also saw that once they stopped walking, they were on the…
