Modern and old doctors agree a walk after a meal will aid in digestion, burn calories, and regulate blood sugar. Passeggiata is the old Italian word for it. It doesn't have to be 5 miles, just get up and go around the block. This will help prevent diabetes from forming in your cardiovascular system. It will also lower your risk of cancer, heart disease, anxiety, and depression. I'm willing to bet your stress will be reduced too. Walking also helps in delaying the onset of dementiia and alheimer's.
On an interesting side note, humans have been taking walks since the dawn of time, thousands of years ago, much in the way we take walks today, paleoanthropologists agree. Sometimes chasing food, sometimes running from it.
I'm about as meat and potato American blue-blood as we come, and I really dislike walking leaisurely and ending up where I started, yet this new(and old) evidence in regulating blood-sugar really motivates me to take walks. Now, I won't be running a marathon any time soon, but a stroll after each meal seems like a small sacrifice for overall health. It may sound silly, but adding a few hops, skips, and jumps into that little foray won't hurt. Or, maybe take the dogs along, they will love it. It just makes sense, you eat food, then help your body digest it.
Another idea to spice up your post-meal walk is to count your steps. This is a strategy that many runners abide by. You can count 1,2,3,4,5,6,7--2,2,3,4,5,6,7--3,2,3,4,5,6,7--and before you know it your food is digesting the way it is meant to, and you're back to your normal routine without loosing too much time.
While this article is about "the walk," any form of exercise after a meal will help with digestion in much the same way as walking. Anything strenuous may cause a poor effect in digestion. Use common sense when judging what your after meal exercise is. Mom says, "don't go swimming after that meal," and why argue, just walk.
