Latest / The Checkpoint Podcast: Questions / Episode 24 | Why do we start worrying about our health more as we get older?
Transcript
- The DECAF Network: Hey, it's Dex, creator of Reboot Player One and host at The Checkpoint. And today's question is why do I worry about my health so much now? Why do I worry about my health so much right now? That could be a lot of things, really. I recorded a video only a couple of second seconds ago where I mentioned the word midlife and how realistically that term is Is pretty false. I could say that I'm I'm approaching midlife now, but that would be the assumption that I live close to 100. if I do, awesome. But what if I live to 120? Like it's not really considered midlife. at the same time, you know, what if what if I die at like 70? Then I'm well past midlife, right? So getting back to to health and midlife. I I think that there's much more of a focus for people around my age because there is that ticking time bomb. There is the the atrophy, there is the the breaking down of muscle and and of bones becoming more brittle. And I was talking to somebody about it today. We as you get older, you and older I'm talking, you know, fifty plus sixties, seventies. More so the older years. You should be doing weights, you should be exercising. Obviously, not to bulk up or anything like that. It's really to protect yourself from falls. It's really to make sure that your bones are strong, your muscles are strong. So if you do happen to fall over, then the damage is limited per se because you are a little bit more solid. So the reason why, you know, people, at least my opinion of you know, why people are. A bit more on top of their health now, worrying about their health now is one, we are getting older. So our bones are starting to break more. Our muscles and tendons just don't seem to stretch quite as they used to. So we have to be careful in that we can't, you know, we can't just it's not like riding a bike where you can ride a bike in your 20s and not ride for 20 or so years and then find a bike and just hop on and it's basically the same as it was. Health isn't like that. I can't, you know, bench a hundred kilos and then not do it for 20 years and then just hop straight back into a hundred kilos. It's just not going to happen. The muscles become weak. And so now when I'm older, I have to be a bit more mindful about my limitations. So it's not. Like I said, it's not hopping back onto a hundred kilo bench press. It it's about actually starting much, much less and and and sort of going up from there. And there's a very good chance that I'll I'll never reach the peak of of my muscle fitness from when I was in my twenties. So that needs to be watched. on top of that, you know, during that process of of getting to a comfortable level of fitness, whether it be cardio or weights, you have to make sure that you recover more. You know, back in the day when you're in your twenties and thirties, you know, recovery was still important, but it was seldom followed. You know, a lot of people would go to the gym every day and just work out and they would see gains. But now we have to take things a little bit slow. Just to make sure that the muscles are okay and they're healed and you know, knees and joints and ligaments and all of that sort of stuff, they they have particular rest periods. Because it's not you know On on on top of that, on top of just making sure that our our joints and muscles are all good, if something does happen, whether there's a tear or a break or a sprain, you know, the bounce back period again isn't a a mid twenties, thirties thing. It's you know, it might have been a week or a couple of days back in the day, and now it's extended out till, you know, two, three weeks, even longer. So there has to be some awareness around that. The other thing is you know, if you have kids and if you're lucky enough to have kids, then you want to keep up with them. You know, this is the kind of age where, you know, if you have kids that are hitting mid teens, they're starting to they're starting to get strong, get big, get fast, and depending on who you are, they're gonna they're gonna beat you. and and sometimes ego gets in the way and you want to try and keep up with them. So you have to be careful about that. You know, it's not You know, i it's it's not a back in the day thing. You know, I know you're pushing X amount of weight, but I used to do more than that and you try it and yeah, let's let's just see how that turns out. So there's a there's a fair bit of ego involved as well, and so you need to keep that in check. So all of these things, you know, have people worried about their health more. And I I recorded a video as well, I think it was maybe might have been a week or so ago, about a word that I just only learnt about, and that was health span. Now we all know what lifespan is. You know, lifespan is the expected age of what an average person would be, depending on your country, depending on your ethnicity, and all of these sorts of things. You know, lifespan could be eighty-five years, eighty-nine years, whatever it is. That's the lifespan. But the term that I heard about was called health span. And basically the health span is the age at which you can expect to live without any major illnesses, physical, mental, any ailments, any any any sort of thing that will affect your quality of life. And and when I was reading about it and talking about it, from memory, I think in Australia, I think the air the average male lifespan was eighty five, I think. But the health span was I think it was maybe seventy. Maybe seventy-five, I I I can't I can't remember. Either way, the the health span is much less than the lifespan. And so that got me thinking, like, I I don't want to live the part you know the the past or the next, sorry. I don't want to live the last couple of decades, decade and a half in pain. I don't want that. So how can you how can you try and avoid that? It's exercise, it's health. and it's it's diet as well. So, you know, whenever I have some days where I wake up and and I feel like not exercising, I I try and go back to that thought in my head about health span. About me getting close to my sixties now, I'm turning fifty soon. And and once you turn fifty, you know, turning sixty probably isn't far off. I don't want to live my sixties and seventies with with pain and discomfort. So I I go back to that that health span word. So that Wow, what else is there? there's just a lot, you know. I have kids, so my answer is is part of that. You want to be around for your kids. You don't want to be a burden to them, you want to you wanna play around with them if they're sport, you wanna you wanna help with them, you want to partake in some of the stuff. You know, there's just a lot, you know. There's there's there are many reasons. and yeah. I think I think I've covered most of it. There's probably more, but at this at this point it it's hard for me to get beyond kids. the health span thing, the the just watching out, you know, it's it definitely is not like riding a bike. Like you have to almost start from scratch. I'm I'm discovering it too. You know, I was I was eating low carb many decades ago and and that really worked for me. I lost a lot of weight. I've recently tried it and it's just not the same. It it's almost like once a particular diet works for you, trying to get back onto it just doesn't have the same effect. So I'm having to watch my health now and watch what I eat and obviously exercise and all of that sort of stuff. So that's it for today's question. if you have questions like this, we chat about this a lot. There's a nice small group of people online. We do this every Wednesday. And if you'd like to partake in some of those chats, drop a comment with the word catch up and I will send you the link. I'm Dex from Ruby Player One and the Checkpoint, and I will see you at the next one. Bye.