When you can't work out

Muscle & Fitness/Hers, Sept, 2004 by Susan Bierma

How can you cope when you become injured or ill and need to lay off exercise for six weeks or even six months?

* Seize the opportunity to try new things--knit, play the saxophone, take up chess, whatever sounds fun and engaging. "Use some of the components of exercise that are contributory toward feeling good, e.g. diaphragmatic breathing perhaps combined with mindful meditation," suggests Kate Hays, PhD, clinical psychologist, author of Move Your Body, Tone Your Mood (New Harbinger Publications, 2002).

* Put the injury into perspective. "A well-rounded way of deriving self-worth through friends, work and family insulates you from a more severe depressive reaction to illness or injury," says Robert Smith, PhD, clinical psychologist and certified sport psychology consultant.

* Use it as a learning experience. According to Ron Carducci, PhD, a clinical psychologist who has worked with the NFL, this is the perfect time to deal with that punitive voice that insists on daily achievement.