Aug 09
28
Breast Cancer Survival and Weights
In the latest news on breast cancer, it appears that lifting weights may help breast cancer survivors live to fight another day. And many many more after that. Let me explain a little further, actually what weight lifting can really help to relieve in breast cancer survivors is a condition that often happens that is caused by the cancer treatment itself, called lymphedema, where the arms and hands often swell painfully in response to the treatment and for a long time after the treatments. Patients were many times told by their doctors, well meaning because that was the belief at the time, to avoid weight training because it actually might make the lymphedema worse in their arms and hands.
The latest study however, shows that the opposite actually holds true. It showed that women who participated in weight training exercises for their arms actually experienced lessened arm and hand swelling and less related pain from it. It makes sense to not avoid weight training in almost any situation, as this has shown to have benefits way outside of cancer survival, with benefits ranging from osteoporosis prevention in women and hormonal regulation in women as well, so weight training definitely benefits women whether they are cancer survivors or not.
In the past, women were even advised to avoid any heavy lifting in their daily routines, such as lifting toddlers and other fairly heavy items that might need to be handled by them, so this even limited their functionality in their everyday lives to some extent. Well, no more since the new study blows the lid off the theory that upper body weight lifting should be avoided in breast cancer survivors. Good thing too, because I knwo there are lots of women out there like me who feel like they would die if they couldn’t do weight training, which to me is the most enjoyable part of my workout.
Women who were in the group that worked out with weights actually suggested that they may have made their lymphedema better by weight training, which is the complete opposite of the former advice, but also could do with chance. The important thing is that they now know that weight lifting definitey doesn’t make the swelling worse, so it’s at least a neutral factor in the swelling, and will not HURT breast cancer survivors certainly.
