Is Yoga for Type 2 Diabetes Beneficial? Having diabetes or being pre-diabetic, beginning a yoga routine on a regular basis coupled with healthy lifestyle changes provides relief from diabetes and its symptoms. Yoga is very beneficial for everyone but there are breathing exercises and postures for people with diabetes that are created to specifically zero in on and stimulate your pancreas.
What are the Benefits of Yoga for Diabetics?
Certain postures in yoga are designed for diabetes that aid in the rejuvenation of the cells of the pancreas and help to increase blood flow to it and improve the ability of the pancreas to produce insulin for your body just as it is supposed to do. When you have diabetes, your pancreas needs all the help it can get in the production of insulin.
Once you decide to and start yoga for diabetes regimens, it can change your feelings of well-being, relieving your symptoms, and a brand new height of physical ease. You want to begin slowly taking it one step at a time by practicing approximately 30-6o minutes first in the morning and then again after dinner in the evening and this should go according to your particular comfort zone. You should be practicing after you have your meals.
Yoga isn’t just helpful for diabetics. It is useful for everyone. It includes different poses, along with deep breathing, and meditation for enhancing your mind, your body, and your spirit. Yoga is a fit for everyone because it offers several various forms and levels. While it can be a rigorous “workout,” a calm and relaxing pace of yoga is useful in lowering your blood sugar, your level of stress, and also can be beneficial for losing weight.
Diabetes is becoming more rampant in the world today. It is a serious disease with weakening or even fatal complications which can include amputations, kidney disease, blindness, and heart disease. But on the brighter side it can be improved significantly and controlled just by making changes in your lifestyle such as exercise, weight loss, and proper diet. But there are also ways that yoga can help too.
Now exercise is a huge part in treating diabetes because it helps in lowering blood sugar levels and also increases insulin sensitivity. You can lessen your risk of developing type 2 diabetes by more than 50% by exercising, eating healthier, and losing weight (as little as 10 pounds). Yoga is so popular today that many folks have chosen to practice it to help fight the both the physical and emotional challenges of losing weight. This is huge!
While there are many different poses in yoga, the basic ones are good to start with and as you progress, you can move on to a more advanced stage of yoga. Beginning at home is a good start but joining a yoga class is good too because you get to practice with others and also communicate with the instructor.
How Does Yoga Specifically Help With Diabetes?
Yoga can help improve your emotional well being. It not only strengthens your body, it can promote the emotional health for you as well. People who take up yoga help themselves by developing the body-mind connection and deep breathing ability. People can be helped by “staying in the moment at present” and can decrease improve one’s well-being while decreasing anxiety at the same time. Most yoga practices include a number of different poses that aid in improving your flexibility, strength, and balance too.
Yoga can be beneficial in preventing cardiovascular disease too. What’s also good about taking this up is that it can be tailored to anyone’s individual ability and fitness “level.” So if you’re a beginner, that’s great. You can begin with very low impact and low cost by starting at home. Just by practicing seated yoga for only 10 minutes daily can improve your fasting blood sugar levels, diastolic blood pressure, and heart rate too.
* Beginners asana (seated) poses
- Bridge pose
- Downward dog
- Plank pose
- Child’s pose
- Tree pose
- Mountain pose
- Corpse pose
You need to begin slowly and not be afraid to change up. It’s not necessary to do everything perfect as the instructor does whether it’s a video or in an actual yoga class. Discuss things with the instructor. It’s vital to eat healthy and be physically active to keep those blood sugars controlled. It’s a wise decision to discuss everything with your doctor because putting exercise, healthy diet, and yoga together is going to help you with your diabetes and that’s the goal.
How Yoga Benefits Your Health
1) Muscle strength- Yoga helps to build strong muscles for you and it’s for more than just appearance. Your muscles will help with flexibility, back pain and pain from arthritis. It also aids the elderly in preventing falls which can be serious at an older age and that’s crucial because it’s serious.
2) Blood flow- This is one of the primary things that yoga does is to increase your blood flow which is exactly what you need for type 2 diabetes too. It gets the blood flowing particularly in your hands and in your feet. The more oxygen your cells can get the better results you will experience. You can “twist and squeeze” more blood from your internal organs which will permit blood that is oxygenated to flow better once you “release” the twist when you are practicing twisting poses.
3) Blood pressure- High blood pressure can be addressed and possibly lowered with yoga. There were effects of the Corpse pose (Savasana) with lowering the systolic number (top) by 25 points and dropping 15 points with the diastolic number (bottom) after a study period of approximately 3 months.
4) Balance- If you practice yoga regularly, you will be helping your balance. Better balance means a possibility of a lesser risk of falling and this is good news for the elderly. For most who practice yoga you can feel less unbalanced and wobbly with the Tree pose. This is great for your balance too.
5) Immune system- The best part of yoga for supporting your immune system is meditation. Pranayama and asana can also play a part in improving your immune system. Your immune system protects you from viruses and diseases and needs to be functioning well to keep your body and your organs in top shape.
6) Heart rate- Let’s face it. Some of us are not into going to a gym to preform hardcore workouts to increase our heart rates but that’s where yoga can help too. Ashtanga in yoga does have the potential to help in bringing your heart rate up into the aerobic range withing in practicing a few sessions or so.
7) Concentration and focus- It’s not just about your physical health when it comes to yoga. It well enhances the conditioning of your psychological health as well. People who practice yoga on a regular basis have a much better ability to concentrate. They are also able to control emotions better and will improve their IQ. There’s nothing wrong with that! Who doesn’t want a higher IQ!
8) Pain relief- You can provide relief from your pain. Meditation and/or asana are able to reduce pain that people have with fibromyalgia, arthritis, carpal tunnel syndrome, and multiple other chronic pain conditions. What’s interesting is that when you relieve pain, you will be more inclined to be active because your mood is better and you will not require as much medication.
9) Self-esteem- If you’re one of the many who suffer from low self-esteem, yoga can help turn this around. You can experience poorer health mentally, physically, and spiritually as well. Taking the positive approach by practicing yoga with the intention of further examining yourself will result in seeing a better and different side of yourself and thereby boosting your self confidence.
10) Nervous system- Scientists have followed yogis for years to see how they control their bodies in exceptional ways of which several are controlled by the nervous system. The seasoned yogis generated certain brain wave patterns and created heart rhythms that were abnormal and by using a specific meditation method, were able to increase their hand temperature by 15 degrees.
11) Happiness- If you’re down in the dumps, sitting in the lotus pose will help you relax and gather your thoughts. Consistently practicing this pose will improve on depression and lead you to a significant level of serotonin. You will feel happier for sure!
12) Joints and cartilage- You give your joints full workout while practicing yoga through a complete range of motion. There are specific areas of cartilage that under normal circumstances may be immobile but can now be compressed and immersed because your joint cartilage is similar to a sponge. It gets the fresh nutrients each time the fluid is squeezed out and the fresh supply gets soaked up.
13) Your posture- Has your mother always told you to stand up straight? Mine too! It’s hard enough for your body to support your head so you don’t want to make it harder by slouching all the time. You can get problems in your neck, back, and other areas from poor posture. By leaning over and slumping your body tries to compensate by taking the inward curves that are normal in your lower back and neck and flattening them out. This gives you a degenerative arthritis of your spine and can cause pain. Practicing yoga will straighten up your posture.
14) Your spine- Protecting your spine is very important. Your spinal disks are like the shock absorbers in your car. They are located between your vertebrae that herniate and compress nerve movements. This is the sole way for them to obtain their nutrients.
15) Focus- Yoga is about focusing in the present moment. Studies performed revealed that regular practice of yoga improves your focus because of also improving your reaction time, coordination, and memory. You will have a much clearer vision of everything.
16) Peace of mind- Yoga is involved in so many problems with health. It can diminish the mental anguish of regret, fear, anger, and stress. Stress is associated with so many ailments such as hypertension, eczema, insomnia, and migraine headaches. Taking a positive approach by practicing yoga will help to ease and quiet your mind so you can live happier and a longer life.
17) Your lungs- Yogis practicing yoga for many years have a tendency to take less breaths but of larger volume and this results in being more efficient and calming as well. This “complete breathing” exercise can help the respiratory rate in people who have lung issues relating to congestive heart failure. Yoga helps with various degrees of the function of the lungs including how efficient the exhalation is and what the biggest volume of the breath is.
Final Thoughts
Yoga for Type 2 Diabetes is extremely helpful. Yoga is very healthy for you as well as being helpful for your type 2 diabetes. Get all the benefits from yoga including diabetes help. This can help you to make a great change in your diabetes and your life.
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I have always heard yoga is good not just for diabetes, but in general if you want to become healthier.
I have never done it before, but imagine your body feels much more relaxed and limber after stretching your body for so long.
Have you ever done yoga before, and if so how did it go?
Hi Michael,
Yes yoga is very good for you and extremely popular today.
It doesn’t require too much effort and can work wonders for diabetes and your mind and your body.
I practiced yoga years ago when I lived in New York and just started again here in Florida.
I missed doing it and I really look forward to it each time I practice.
Thanks for your comments!
~Rob
Great article!
I love the ideas for beginner poses. I feel like it’s so important to stay active and healthy both physically and mentally, and I feel like I get to do both when I practice yoga. Yoga is such a fantastic work out for people at any exercise level!
Hi Ryan,
Beginner poses are great especially for people with diabetes who need help.
It’s wonderful and beneficial for diabetes and yoga is calm and relaxing for your mind and body.
You don’t need experience and can practice anywhere anytime.
Yoga is great for everyone both mentally and physically.
Thanks Ryan!
I agree that yoga is not just beneficial for people with diabetes, it’s helpful for everyone!
For me, some of the biggest benefits I’ve noticed is the ability to concentrate, like you mentioned. For the longest time, I was unable to focus on one task at a time. With so many distractions in today’s world we need time to just unplug and relax. Yoga gives you a way to do just that!
It’s no wonder yoga is so popular with what it can do for you. It’s easy and inexpensive and relaxing as well.
With so much stress in life it’s great to have yoga to turn to.
I love how it relaxes me and helps with diabetes. All you have to do is to take action!
Thank you for your comments!
~Rob
I did yoga years ago, but just as exercise and to get more stretches, and never realized it can help with diabetes! Great article, thank you so much. Can you recommend any good video courses online so I can practice yoga at convenience of my home? Thank you in advance!
Yoga is good for everyone and especially for diabetes. It’s great to be able to practice on your own time and at home.
This is great for beginners: Click here
Thank you for your input 🙂