After your hernia repair surgery, you will need to gradually reintroduce physical activity to avoid jeopardizing a successful recovery. Since an abdominal hernia can be the result of muscle stress or strain, your choice of exercise during recovery should begin to address the causes of your hernia in a gentle, non-threatening fashion which can build into a regular regimen as the weeks go by. Swimming is a wonderful way to begin strengthening your abdominal muscles. The buoyancy of the water creates a weightless opportunity to work isolated muscle groups with slow and gentle motions.
Instructions
Week 1
1. Enter the water in the shallow end carefully, using the handrail.
2. Practice several standing glides in the water. From a standing position, slowly lie forward on the surface of the water, face down, reaching your arms out in front of you to form a "V." Lifting off very slightly with your feet glide over the water. Repeat five times.
3. Hold a kick board against your chest with your arms crossed around it. Slowly lie back in the water, allowing the kick board to buoy your body to the surface. Relax in the water, and gently flutter kick your feet with knees slightly bent. If this activity does not feel straining, make your way backward to the other side of the pool. When you get there, repeat the other way, but do not push off the side.
4. Practice in the pool two to three times this week for best results.
Week 2
5. Continue the exercises from Week 1, adding deep water aerobic work. Wearing your water jogging belt for better stability and flotation, water jog for five minutes, moving legs carefully with knees bent and pumping arms as well.
6. Rest for one minute, then repeat five minutes of water jogging.
7. Remove your jogging belt. Gently pushing off from the side, swim backstroke to the shallow end, reaching slowly with good arm extension and gently flutter kicking.
8. Swim freestyle two lengths of the pool, using slow, smooth arm strokes and an easy, modified flutter kick.
9. Practice this regimen three to four times this week.
Weeks 3 to 5
10. Add more repetitions and minutes to your swimming workout as your energy comes back and your post-surgery pain decreases.
11. Add two to four pool lengths of kicking practice using a kick board to strengthen quads--thigh muscles--and abs--stomach muscles. Holding the board beneath your upper torso with forearms and hands, let the board buoy you on the surface of the water while you flutter kick. Do not attempt to do the breaststroke--"frog"--kick until your recovery is more advanced, because this kick can cause strain in the groin area.
12. Swim some sprints to increase the aerobic benefits of your practice. Try swimming a length of the pool as quickly as you can. If this does not cause a strain on your hernia repair area, add three more sprint lengths, resting 30 seconds in between each sprint. Remember, when you push off the side of the pool, keep it smooth and gentle.
13. Add more repetitions as your recovery progresses, swimming four times per week, and before you know it, your entire body will be feeling healthy, strong and even better than its pre-surgery best.
Tags: flutter kick, kick board, your hernia, board buoy, cause strain, five minutes