Jumping Wasn't Such a Bad Idea After All!

For many, seeing children jumping on the bed or even jumping rope often bring back memories of yesteryear. But, who would have imagined the beneficial results of jumping on your bones? Recently physical activity has found itself in the spot light, more so than usual. Physical activity has been directly related both negatively and positively to weight management, living healthier, and injuries.

Bones are vital to the human structure. Over time this support system eventually wears down and can lead to serious problems. Not being active is one factor in experiencing a rapid decrease in bone density; however, studies have also begun to find that over exercising can also lead to bone loss. So the question is what can be done to maintain good bone density? It turns out kids may have the right idea, simply jumping up and down. This fun and relatively simply activity has been researched in Japan with female rats and what they found was amazing. By jumping up and down an equivalent of 40 times a week over a 24 week period, the female rats were found to have significantly increased their bone mass. The rats continued to maintain their bone mass with just a little jumping every week after that.¹

Granted jumping on the bed is not recommended for achieving greater bone density for obvious reasons.  Though the next time the thought of heading to the gyms is a complete turn off, or for those of you that do not go at all, a little jump rope or the simple act of jumping jacks may just be what you need. So the next time there are children jumping it might be a good time to rekindle those memories and jump in with them.