walking
 

3 months post accident, symptomatic 24/7

one doc says take a walk a day

other says nothing til symptoms go away..

feels like they are never going away...

do i walk once a day or no

A gentle walk in a quiet area with good soft healed shoes should be OK. I mentioned this before. Put foam ear plugs in so you can hear your foot falls/foot plants. You will hear the impact intensity your foot plant transmits to your brain. Then you can learn to take softer steps to cause less jarring to your head.

Do not walk for aerobic exercise. This is to get some fresh air and some gentle blood flow going through your brain and body.

Walking on grass should be easy on your head. Or an artificial surface running track.

Try baby steps - literally 2-3 minutes. Then 5 then 10. Pay attention to your body. WEar eyeglasses, hat/visor, take a cane/stick to steady your walk if you need to.

The daily walk will help the brain and body get back in touch--the fresh air is also very healing. But go at a pace/distance that is not too hard but just right for you.

When it was really bad for me, at first I could barely walk just around my appartment, then I slowly graduated to walking to the mailbox and going up the stairs (super slow). Then started exploring a little further, until I was able to slowly walk around the block or so. I'm almost a year into my PCS and can only tolerate 30-40 mins of slow walking.
But being able to get outside and do some walking always felt great. Sometimes it feels like a slow walk after dinner actually helps with my symptoms.

walking
 

Great advice here from all.

Walking really helped me and I still walk every day if I can. Take it very slowly and like Mark said, this is not for big aerobic exercise. It will get your blood moving though and that feels nice.

I started with very short walks to my mailbox and back. That could be too much for you. Just gauge it by how you feel and stop before it's too much.

I hope you benefit from some gentle exercise. I surely did and still do.

Take care

pm

I feel that everyone pretty well summarized how to deal with walking. I would only add that just because you feel good doesn't mean you should keep walking further. It is very easy to over-do it and you won't know that you've done so until much later. Take it easy.

Yeah, like many here, I learned the hard way that just because it feels ok to push yourself now, doesn't mean you should.

For myself, I worked out a little system where I would go walk the same trail/route every time. I would start at a slow pace and go a short distance. After a couple days of that (weeks at first), if it felt ok, I would increase either the distance or the pace by a slight amount, and see how it goes, if it felt worse, I would back off to the previous distance/pace.

Great advice in this thread. I too could barely walk at first, with nasty setbacks if I overdid it (which was easy to do).

I'm now mostly back to normal, but it has taken 2.5 years. It probably took a year and a half before I was walking somewhat normally. I'm still careful to avoid jarring and overexertion. For me it was (and continues to be) a long road back.

My advice is to try to be patient and take the long view. The gains add up, but it can take a while - sometimes much longer than you think. Get as much rest as you can and increase the walking and other activity very gradually. Sometimes it will feel like you're plateauing or even regressing. Just ease off gently and rest. You can bring it down a notch and try again in a day or two or three. Recovery is truly a marathon, not a sprint. You will get better if you learn to back off and not push through symptoms.