Making everyday activities feel easier, 5 of 5

Getting up from a deep sofa

This is week 4 of the blog series “making everyday activities feel easier”.  The topics are based on 12 years of clients asking Vintage Fitness trainers to help them to do these activities with ease.

This week is about how to get up from a low soft sofa. When we first meet with clients we talk about their goals and for our frail older adults they often mention that they only sit in a few chairs in their homes because they have trouble getting up and out of low soft sofas.

I chatted with Dr Ashely Worobec, a chiropractor in Burlington, to better understand why this is such a common issue for many older people and how to fix it.  When getting up from a low chair the muscles doing most of the work at the beginning of the movement are your glutes and as you stand up your quadriceps kick in.  Many older adults have weak glutes which makes getting up and out of a low seat a challenge.

Try these 2 exercises to develop your glutes and sit in any chair you like!