On Teaching Seniors: The Benefits Flow Both Ways!

by Bridget

Wet Handlebars by Melina Meza

While not yet a senior myself, I do teach seniors at the North Berkeley Senior Center. I came to yoga with serious, debilitating back pain—caused by high-speed, over-the-handlebars bike accidents in my teens, and untreated whiplash from several car accidents later on. The gentle Iyengar-style yoga taught at The Yoga Room in Berkeley set me on a path of healing. So, to me, yoga has been a therapeutic, kind and compassionate endeavor—one that has strengthened my back and quieted my mind to an extraordinary degree. Because of this, teaching seniors and working with any physical limitations they may have has been a pretty natural process.

My students at the senior center range in age from late-50s to late-80s. Within the group there's also quite a range of abilities, but there is such a sweet cohesiveness, and a sense of community and support for each other. I try to keep class moving along for the more active students, but everyone is patient when I spend some extra time making sure a new student can keep up. A core group arrives early to set up chairs and bring props into the room from the storage closet, and at the end of class everyone works together to get the room cleaned up, chatting about their interesting, full lives as they go. Last week, one of my students told me that she always feels better after she comes to my class. I paused for a moment to take that in and I realized that I always feel better after teaching it too.

These active seniors are always up for trying something new. I remember the first time I taught a modified inversion – handstand with feet on the chair – an 83-year-old student (after I’d offered an assist and some suggestions for strengthening her pose) stepped down from the chair, looked up at me, and said, “That was FUN!” Of course, handstand isn’t for everyone, and we work carefully up to a final pose. I always offer alternatives, explain potential health hazards, and I often turn poses into “partner poses” just so they can have someone watching and can help each other to remember the details. The partner work also cuts down on the number of people actually attempting a pose at one time, giving me a better chance to keep an eye on the entire room.

While active, eager and ambitious, they also tire more easily than my other student populations. One of my first experiences teaching seniors, I was substituting a class regularly taught by Herta Weinstein. This large class came with an assistant who knew the students well. After I’d led them through nearly half of the ambitious practice I had planned for the hour and a half class, the assistant leaned over and whispered, “I think they need to rest.” I was surprised to realize that the sighing I was hearing was about them wanting a break, not them wanting me to hurry up!

There's never any rush to get it right. That's the beauty of yoga - there is always something new to work on, so you'll never run out of topics to explore, muscles to strengthen and alignment to finesse. My students have reported feeling stronger, better-balanced and more energetic with the addition of the yoga practice. From my perspective, they are all gaining form and body awareness that is gorgeous to behold.

One of my favorite things about teaching this population is their dedication, both to yoga and to the community they’ve developed in the room. Another is that they’re tremendously creative and interesting. I’ve attended piano concerts, photo exhibits, and a Weavers Guild exhibit, all featuring the work of my students. I’ve also attended live performances, eco-movies and co-op dinners with my students, and any time it’s cold you’ll see me wearing a hat crocheted by one of them. My life is so enriched by their presence, and I continue to count working with them among the highlights of my week.

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Yoga May Be the Best Activity for the Elderly

by Carol Krucoff, E-RYT 500

Inviting elderly people to try yoga can be challenging, since many harbor the common misconception that you must be young and fit—or at least able to get down and up from the floor—to practice. That’s why I always tell prospective students: If you can breathe, you can do yoga.

Now, a new study suggests that for older adults—even frail elders in their 80s and 90s—yoga offers substantial health benefits and may be the best form of physical activity.  Writing in the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, geriatrician Neela K. Patel, MD, MPH, CMD, and colleagues at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, performed a meta-analysis of 18 randomized control trials of yoga for people over age 60 and compared the results with those from other exercise programs for seniors (see here). Her conclusion: 

“Yoga may be superior to conventional physical-activity interventions in elderly people.”

I recently had a lovely interview with Dr. Patel; it was very exciting to see research that supports what we teach! According to Dr. Patel, many health problems facing seniors can be directly influenced by yoga:

“Yoga not only improves health-related quality of life, but also enhances walking and balance, muscle strength, cardiovascular health, blood pressure, sleep and functioning of other systems. Yoga may also have psychosocial benefits through prevention and control of common health and emotional problems linked with aging.”

All four aspects of exercise, as outlined by the National Institute on Aging—strength, endurance, flexibility and balance—can be improved through an appropriate yoga practice, Dr. Patel told me, adding that the ability to individualize the practice and its social nature may also benefit seniors. But the most important aspect, she says, may be yoga’s impact on enhancing seniors’ ability to perform activities of daily living and maintain independence.

“Having the leg strength to get up and down from the bed to go to the toilet, and the arm strength to open a door, can make a tremendous difference in an older adult’s life,” she says. “And yoga goes beyond physical health, to help relieve anxiety and calm the mind, which is also critical.”

Dr. Patel has observed the impact of yoga practice on older adults first hand, as her husband, Sreedhara Akkihebbalu, teaches classes to elderly residents of an independent living community and a nursing home—ages 75 to 102. Perceived benefits among those students in independent living include improved gait and balance, deceased pain, decreased need for medications, improved sleep, less anxiety and depression and increased mobility. She notes:

“For the oldest old, the breathing practice can be particularly beneficial. Yoga shows great potential for improving quality of life in even the frailest of older adults."

Carol Krucoff, E-RYT 500, is co-director of the Therapeutic Yoga for Seniors teacher training offered at Duke Integrative Medicine and the Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health, and co-creator of the new DVD, “Relax into Yoga for Seniors,” available at pranamaya.com.  She is author of several books including Healing Yoga for Neck and Shoulder Pain.  Visit her websites:  yoga4seniors.com and healingmoves.com.

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