Seniors who are living in a nursing home can already be depressing and boring, what more if the one living in a senior nursing home is a handicap. All seniors, not just handicapped seniors are a very high risk of feeling isolated and lonely when they are sent to nursing homes because there is no one from their family that can take good care of them. Staffs working in the nursing home may be the only people they can see and interact with. Getting handicapped seniors engage in various easy stimulating activities can help in keeping them active physically, mentally, socially, and emotionally.

Activity for Handicapped Seniors: Tai Chi

Tai chi is a type of martial art that can be performed by not just young people, but also by seniors even handicapped seniors. Tai chi is even recommended to be performed by handicapped seniors since tai chi can really help in relaxing both the mind and the muscles, and mind you, it does not need any fancy equipments and tai chi is even a type of low impact activity. However, when seniors perform tai chi, it should be done with the help and support of tai chi experts, as to gain all benefits from the exercise and ensure safety.

Benefits of Tai Chi to Handicapped Seniors

Just as mentioned above, tai chi can help in bringing both the mind and the muscles into a relaxing state. Tai chi can also be good in stimulating the brain to function and keeping the physical body active. Tai chi does not only provide physical stress relief and mental stress relief, it can also help in effectively reducing bone loss that normally comes with age, pain relief from arthritis, stimulates endorphin hormones that can dramatically improve the mood, and even decrease blood pressure. Researches and studies show that regularly performing tai chi can help in preventing seniors from having strokes or it can promote stroke recovery in seniors who are previously stroke patients.

When to Do Tai Chi

Not all forms or positions of tai chi can be done by seniors and handicapped seniors. There are numerous forms of tai chi that can be easy to be followed by seniors and handicapped seniors. Tai chi can be performed at least 3 times a week, and by doing tai chi for 3 times a week or more in a span of 2 months, it has been proven that there will be very significant improvement in seniors’ physical and mental body.