Adaptive fitness classes help people find their personal path to fitness – Madison.com

This summer Jane Schmieding biked 650 miles — 10 for every year of her life — on a red hand bicycle.

It’s yet another athletic accomplishment the biking, skiing and paddleboarding multiple sclerosis patient from Madison credits to a UW-Madison program geared toward training people with disabilities to find ways to get and stay fit.

“It’s just changed my life and my outlook on life and just let me try so many different things,” said Schmieding, who has been with the program since 1999. “I can’t see my life without exercising and doing things.”

That’s the attitude that UW-Madison professor Tim Gattenby encourages in the adaptive fitness class he runs through the university’s kinesiology department. It’s a popular program that goes beyond physical therapy to help clients with all kinds of disabilities maintain active lifestyles while simultaneously training UW-Madison students to become a new breed of professionals in the medical field.

For people with disabilities, insurance typically will only cover a certain amount of physical therapy. If they stop making improvements — even if they have a progressive condition and are working to maintain their physical abilities — therapy can end.

“Now I realize that therapy is Medical-Assistance type programming and has to have some way of measuring who and how long do we work with somebody,” said Gattenby, 56. “But when people get to that point when they don’t have anywhere else to go, they come to me.”

Gattenby believes his clients can achieve just as much as anyone else — even if they do have to do it a little differently sometimes — and that reflects the theme of the program, which is “no limits.”

“We don’t really put limitations on anyone, we’re never going to tell a client when they walk through the door that you can’t do that. We’re going to work as hard we can with them to get them back to meeting their goals,” UW-Madison student helper Kaylin Chiolino said.

What are you working on?

To motivate the clients, Gattenby has them define clear goals at the beginning of each semester.

“What are you working on?” Gattenby asked Charles Cowart Sr. at the start of this summer — Cowart’s first experience with the program.

Cowart, 50, of Madison, went through a spinal surgery last year. A doctor told him he wouldn’t walk again. But with physical therapy, he started walking with a walker or cane and now he is focused on keeping his balance independently.

“Therapy is more like middle school, and Tim’s class is like, ‘You’re in high school now so you’re going to do more,’” Cowart said.

When Gattenby asked him to set his goals, Cowart explained that he wants to regain his old life. He misses walking without a device, working at his job as a forklift driver and playing basketball.

“I want to get stronger,” Cowart said. “I want to get my balance where I won’t need to depend on any device and I think that it’s the right program for me.”

After eight weeks in the summer program, Gattenby calls Cowart one of his stars. Already Cowart feels stronger and he even walks around his house independently sometimes. When Gattenby asked about the fall semester, Cowart signed up immediately.

Dee Squire’s goals for her first semester in the class were different. Now 62 and living in Waunakee, her muscular dystrophy resurfaced 10 years ago and she has since fought its progression through personal fitness. By working out at a local gym about five days a week, she has so far avoided needing a wheelchair. This summer she started the class looking for new ideas for keeping her strength.

“Each year it progressively got worse to the point where, first it was leg braces, then the next year it was a cane. I started using a cane, and the next year it was using a walker. So I’m really fighting against it getting worse,” Squire said.

During the class she was able to ride a bike, use different equipment, learn new techniques from the students and was even invited to go water skiing —although she couldn’t make it due to a scheduling conflict. She signed up for future semesters and is especially excited about the swimming class.

“To me a lot of this stuff is just functional stuff, I don’t want my husband to have to be stuck here or have someone have to help me out of a chair. That is just something that is really hard for me. I’m pretty independent,” Squire said. “A gallon of milk is eight pounds and I want to still be able to take my right arm and reach in the refrigerator for a gallon of milk.”

Demand outstrips space

About 100 clients can take part in the program each semester and often those who start with the program sign up to continue. Because of lack of space in the gym, there aren’t enough slots for everyone who wants to join.

Between the one-on-one attention from UW-Madison students and other university resources, there really isn’t another comparable adaptive fitness program in Wisconsin or elsewhere, Gattenby said.

Gattenby and the clients even work with the engineering department and other local design companies to design special fitness equipment.

Some clients drive all the way from Milwaukee and Black River Falls to participate in the classes. Gattenby hopes to see programs like UW-Madison’s spread to other communities and open up more opportunities for people with disabilities.

“My ultimate wish is to see more opportunities, more sections, bigger classes, better facilities, better ways to serve people with disabilities and ‘diversabilities,’ but also more ways to train more people to do what we do,” Gattenby said.

Benefits cut both ways

Most times this summer, each client had two or three UW-Madison students to work with.

Such collaborations don’t just benefit the clients but also give UW-Madison students a chance to work directly in the field. Many of the students who work with Gattenby aspire to be medical professionals and will likely work with people with disabilities throughout the course of their future careers.

“The feeling that you get when someone accomplishes something that they didn’t think that they could do, I don’t think you can recreate that feeling pretty much anywhere else,” UW-Madison senior Delaney Sanders said.

Betty Merten, who has been a client in the program for 10 years, feels the same way about watching the students grow.

“I see some coming in so timid and so ‘I don’t want to do anything wrong’ attitude. And by the end of the semester they’re beaming,” Merten, 59, of Madison said. “It’s just beautiful to watch.”

Merten, born with spina bifida, will roll the distance of a half marathon in her wheelchair with the help of one of the students at the end of the summer.

In the same boat

Steve Slack, 32, of Sun Prairie and paraplegic after a home explosion about five years ago, feels one of the most important parts of the class is the sense of community between the clients.

When he came in for the first time this semester on the last week of class the other clients joked that he was a little late — he missed most of his fourth summer with the program because of the recent arrival of his newborn daughter. He and Schmieding, who know each other from years in the program, even kidded that he needed to lose the “baby weight” as he prepped for his workout.

“I showed up here and I would say it absolutely changed my life and my perspective, and made me active again,” Slack said. “Through here I’ve done cross country skiing, I got involved in adaptive water skiing, adaptive rock climbing, kayaking and then eventually I searched and found a wheelchair basketball team, which I would have never done, or had the physical ability to do, unless I had been here.”

Clients say it’s inspiring to watch people struggling with the same challenges achieve their goals. When she first started the class Squire remembers admiring Schmieding’s independence as she rolled into the gym on her red scooter, lifted herself onto the exercise machine and started working out on her own.

“It’s important to see some people who are kind of in the same boat,” Squire said. “We can still try. We can still get stronger.”

from myhealtyze http://www.myhealtyze.tk/adaptive-fitness-classes-help-people-find-their-personal-path-to-fitness-madison-com/