Exercise advice for the injured

I saw my doctor yesterday and found out the pain in my achilles tendon is from bone spurs and is causing inflammation.  I have to wear a removable cast to immobize my foot and allow the inflammation  to heal.  It not clear how long this will take.  3-4 weeks at a minimum.  I can swim so when the whether is ammenable here in CT I can do that on the weekends.  I obviously can't do anything that involves walking or the like.  I plan on trying the continue strength training as this does not involve a walking motion.  Any thoughts or advice about how this type of excercise my help me with fitness/weight loss while I heal?  Thanks in advance.

Probably the best advice I can give is to really work on stretching.  I have bone spurs due to the way I walk from being overweight.  I don't take full strides and strike hard on my heal.  My PT advised the best thing for me to do is work on stretching at least twice a day.  So, I usually will put a warm pack around my foot and ankle first, then I will work on stretching after that.  If the bone spurs are small enough, they should go away.  If you can do the stationary bicycle that would be great.  Swimming is perfect as it works your cardio and just about every muscle in your body.  I also started Pilates at home.  I found a few DVDs and one of them includes a thera-band (it's a stretchy band..mine is purple).  It helps to add resistance to your training.  I can do the pilates in my hotel room or at home (travel for work a lot).  It really is helping me with my core and my flexibility. 

Good luck and take care!

 Hi Michele, I had Bone Spurs in both heels When I was in my late 20s, Mine were caused by extra a weight and wearing flip flops and flat shoes. I was given cortisone injections and given heal cups and mine went away with in a year but I feel your pain.
Anyway back to exercise when we were in our options classes at Kaiser they had us do a chair aerobics class. You might want to look into that one it was pretty good its for people that cant get up and jump around just yet.
Hope you feel better soon.

I had those too.  This one is different in that the bone spur is on top of my heel and at  the base of the tendon.  Heel cups wouldn't help this and cortisone shots are not recommended because of what it could do the the tendon. 

Thanks for the excercise advice.

In the long run the weight training will serve you as much if not more than running or other forms of cardio.  Remember that muscle requires more calories when untilized, so the more muscle you have the more calories you burn.  By increasing lean muscle mass you will also increase your Resting Metabolic Rate, this is the amount of calories your body burns just to function, so the higher your RMR the more calories you burn just living.

While you do burn less calories in an hour of weight training than you might burn doing moderate to intense cardio the caloric burn from your cardio ends when your heart rate returns to it's normal rythm, where as your body has to repair and rebuild the muscle damage from lifting weights.  Yes the only way to build new muscle is to damage existing muscle it is while your body is repairing this damage that you gain new muscle, main reason you don't gain 5 pounds of muscle in 1 or 2 weeks of weight lifting, this process requires calories. So while you burn less calories lifting weights you will continue to burn them as your body rebuilds.

So exercising for the injured requires you doing what you can.  I am currently fighting a shoulder injury.  I have just after 3 weeks got back to being able to run without immediate pain.  I can do weight training for my legs but if I walk in my gym I know I will do more than I should so I avoid it. 

A good exercise program should combine cardio and weight training.

Good Luck

I do these at work.  They look easy, but if you do them enough and properly, you'd be surprised.

http://exercise.about.com/cs/exerciseworkouts/l/blofficeworkout.htm