A Surprising Benefit of Exercise

I've never been a fan of exercise. Even though I always sympathized with the person who said, "Whenever I feel the urge to exercise, I go inside and lie down until it passes." I've been something of a sporadic exerciser in my adult years—jogging with my friend John Bower and my sister-in-law Paula, stair climbing when we lived in Spain, and walking through Okinawan neighborhoods the first time we lived in Okinawa. It was only when I was told that I was borderline diabetic that I began to walk seriously. After returning to Austin in 2008, I diligently used the treadmill and the elliptical machine in the little gym in our apartment complex, and with increasing fitness, I was able to get my blood sugar under control. Then when my pleural effusion started last winter, I stopped most of my walking until it was cured at the end of May. Since then I have walked with some regularity and regained some of the fitness I had lost.

Why am I writing about exercise? Because I might not have been offered the extrapleural pneumonectomy if I had not been exercising regularly for the last few years. As I wrote earlier in "A Busy Week," my pulmonary function test results were not very encouraging. The surgeons like to have a score of at least 40 on the tests, and my score was 35. However, as my surgeon said, my big toe doesn't care about how my lungs are functioning. It only cares about whether it is getting enough oxygen. Consequently, my exercise stress test became very important, and I showed that I was able to supply my toe with plenty of oxygen. As a result, my surgeon was able to offer the surgery with a clear conscience. So while I was exercising in the hope of preventing heart problems and of keeping my blood sugar under control, the exercise seems to have paid off in my cancer treatment, something that I never anticipated. The rewards of exercise are manifold and can even improve ones chances of a longer life or a cancer cure. To my family and friends who do not exercise regularly, I heartily recommend finding an exercise that you can enjoy or at least tolerate and getting with it. Not only will you feel better and have more energy, but you never know what other benefits exercise can provide.

David