: What are some ways to ease a 50 year old asthmatic woman into yoga? My aunt is severely asthmatic. She is slightly overweight, with most of her fat being on her hips and tummy. Our family doctor has advised light yoga to

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If her doctor has not already given you a list of exercises, this site has a list of concerns for more obese people doing yoga:

Bending forward is in varying degrees hampered by the abdomen. If one is quite fat, it’s like trying to lean over a beach ball.
The fat person usually finds it difficult to internally rotate the hips. Fat on the thighs spreads the legs apart, outwardly rotating the hips. This accounts for the characteristic widebased gait and open-legged seated posture of the fat person. The resultant contracture (if a person has been fat for a long time) in the external rotators makes postures that require the legs to remain together difficult and even painful.
Fat in the upper arms and the upper/middle back makes putting the hands together behind the back difficult, as does the fat person’s increased ratio of torso circumference to arm length. Take the Circle of Joy, add a fat person, and presto! — instant Circle of Frustration. (Actually, this is easily solved simply by moving the arms behind one instead of clasping the hands.)
Fat people tend to have some neck difficulty, because of the habitual need to crane the neck forward to get closer to something to read, eat or whatever. If the tummy dictates that the person must sit further from a desk, the neck and shoulders bear the brunt of bringing the head and hands forward to lean over a book or dinner plate. Unlike in pregnant women, for a fat person this “lean forward” part happens for an extended period of time; it could lead to a chronic unhealthy curve in the cervical spine, and even a “widow’s hump.”


It’s interesting that, because of these four differences, it’s often the simpler asanas that are difficult for the fat person, whereas some more challenging ones are actually easier for most.

They also have a list of recommended exercises at the bottom (site provides links, which I am too lazy to provide here):

Adho Mukha Shvasana
Ardha Matsyendrasana
Balasana
Bhujangasana
Chandrasana
Dandasana
Dhanurasana
Garudasana
Janushirasana
Jathara Parivartanasana
Matsyasana
Padahastasana
Parvatasana
Paschimotanasana
Salabhasana
Sarvangasana
Sasamgasana
Savasana
Setu Banghasana
Siddhasana
Standing Backward Bend
Surya Namaskar (Sun Salutation)
Tadasana
Trikonasana
Ustrasana
Utkatasana
Vajrasana
Viparita Karani
Virabhadrasana
Vrikasana