Working out with an injury

I’m trying to lose somewhere around 10 lbs, and I’ve been walking/jogging 2-3 miles a day and significantly cutting my calories. I was so excited bc I started to feel so much healthier and happier and I knew soon I’d get some results. Unfortunately tonight I sprained my ankle very badly and can not walk. I don’t know how long until I can again but I was wondering if anyone had some fat loss workouts that don’t include putting weight on my ankle. I still wanna keep going with my progress! 😭

Replies

  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,458 Member
    edited June 27
    I use walking as my primary exercise too, and a couple years ago I badly sprained my ankle.

    Can you walk on it at all? It took about a week of Ice, Elevation, Rest, Compression for me until the swelling really was down.

    I bought a lace-up ankle support device on amazon, and after the first initial week of severe pain I was able to keep walking using that support thingy. It's awesome. It's thin enough to wear under shoes. I don't remember the brand, but it looks like this: https://www.ultraankle.com/product/ultra-360-lace-up/#description

    Luckily, fat loss is about food, not walking. Just so you know, when you're injured that causes inflammation which is water, which shows up on the body weight scale. The other thing is that healing is faster with sufficient calories, so it's recommended to eat at your Maintenance calories when acutely injured. You can reset your Goals to "Maintain my weight."
  • tulips_and_tea
    tulips_and_tea Posts: 5,744 Member
    Sorry to hear about your ankle! That's very painful and you have to be patient and let it heal properly.

    Last year I had a bad case of gout in my right foot / ankle and it was SO painful I couldn't put a sock on or even touch it without icing it, but I use the FitOn app and found several Pilates workouts (full body) that you can do on a mat without even standing up. While not cardio, they were really good workouts and I still do them.

    I'll see if I can find the exact ones I used. If so, I'll post them. But don't discredit body weight or other types of exercises just because you can't walk for a while.
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 34,620 Member
    edited June 28
    One option to consider: There are YouTube videos of pretty vigorous mainly upper body exercises designed for wheelchair athletes. Also, some gyms or physical therapy practices have arm bikes.