You should act your age — at least when it comes to exercising. Here’s why | Well actually
Last year, I had to give up running. It was, as my sports medicine doctor advised me, “time.”
Since I was a teenager, this has been my primary form of exercise and stress relief. But for months, I ignored the small signs that my condition was deteriorating: the popping and grinding in my right knee and hip joints whenever I stood, bended, or walked up the stairs. The medical term for this is crepitus, yet I stubbornly kept convincing myself that I was still “young” in my 50s.
I’ve imbibed the popular positive aging message: “50 is the new 30.” However, in terms of the cells that make up the hamstrings, hip tendons, and cartilage, 50 is still very much 50.Biological age“It could be much younger than our chronological age.
For decades, I’d been doing everything the experts recommended — eating well, sleeping well, exercising — and yet my doctor was still telling me it was time to adjust to my changing body.
My naturopathic doctor told me that many of his Gen Every trendy sport or exercise sends a new wave of us to the office and others love it. For example, Study 2020 It found that approximately 91% of people who presented to the emergency room with pickleball-related injuries were older than 50 years.
Many people treat their fitness as if they were a decade or two younger. My GP told me that patients over 50 are often frustrated by any suggestion that they should change their routine. I began to see this denial of physical realities everywhere. One of my teammates injured her shoulder while doing CrossFit, then injured herself again a few months later while doing the same routine. A friend who has been practicing yoga for decades fractured her chin while falling from crow pose. When I suggested she tweak her routine, she scoffed.
As a medical anthropologist, I wondered: Have anti-aging messages accidentally created a new problem? Was our generation at risk not because of a lack of exercise, like the boomer and silent generations that preceded us, but because of excessive exercise?
How our bodies change as we age
Dr. Emily Finkelstein, a geriatrician at Weill Cornell Medical College, likes that people in their 40s, 50s and 60s have internalized that exercise is important for healthy aging and longevity. However, there are some practical considerations.
“Our muscle mass and performance peak in our mid-30s, and then start to decline naturally after that,” Finkelstein said. “We need to be flexible about what we do and expect of ourselves.”
When we pass the age of 45, we begin to lose critical muscle mass, which can reduce our strength and balance. Low bone density can make us more susceptible to stress fractures caused by repetitive movements and stress. The cartilage in our joints becomes thin, while tendons and ligaments stiffen. All this means that we are more susceptible to injuries during physical activity. Recovery also takes longer.
“The thing that people don’t know and don’t learn is that aging starts at birth, and your abilities will definitely change,” said Dr. Rosanne Leipzig. Leipzig knows a lot about this process, both as a professor of geriatrics and palliative medicine at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, and as a woman in her 70s.
“You reach maximum muscle mass, bone strength, and ability to remember a list of words in your 30s,” she said. “It all starts to decline after that.” “Aging doesn’t mean you can’t do what you used to do, but maybe you can’t do as much in the same amount of time.”
Most experts agreed that messages like “50 is the new 30” could be helpful if they persuaded people not to write themselves off as they get older. It’s okay to push ourselves a little physically. But the flip side is assuming that a 50-year-old body is no different from a 30-year-old body. that it.
“One of the best things we can do for our healthy aging is to be flexible and adaptable,” Finkelstein said. “We need to change our expectations, and we need to change the way we exercise as we get older.”
How to adapt to Ageobjects and avoid injury
In midlife, we should all learn to be more in tune with our bodies. This could mean spending more time recovering between intense workouts, doing more stretching and incorporating more weights into our fitness routines.
A healthy adaptive approach to exercise as we age may include regular self-monitoring and evaluation of how our bodies feel during and after workouts, and seeking input from a qualified medical professional when we begin to notice any signs or symptoms of a creeping problem, such as pain or discomfort.
Leipzig suggests that doctors start conversations about modifications by asking patients what they like about the activity they’re sticking to. A tennis player might really like the social aspect. In this case, they can switch to a game of pickleball — which is less stressful, but similar — with supplemental strength training and a stretching regimen to prevent injuries.
But since the risk of injury naturally rises as we age, it’s also important to have a backup plan for when we overdo it. When I spoke with Dr. Melissa Lieber, an associate professor of orthopedic surgery and emergency medicine at the Icahn School of Medicine, she had just finished working at the U.S. Open. Lieber has a lot of experience dealing with athletes – both professional and amateur – who have put too much pressure on themselves.
“Some people are good at adapting and feel comfortable with changing their bodies,” Lepper said. “Others act blatantly. I’ve seen some patients who don’t even want to take a day off.”
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Lieber advises patients to switch things up while allowing their bodies to recover. So, if you’re a runner with an injury, try a modified strength-training routine and a low-impact activity, like swimming. Then, when you start running again, run fewer times a week or for shorter distances. To avoid injury or overuse, experts recommend at least one or two days of rest per week.
Strength training is also very important. “The stronger you are, the more you’ll avoid injury and falling,” Lieber said. “And when you fall, you’ll fall differently. Your balance will be better, and you’ll recover from injury faster.”
As a rule of thumb, Lieber recommends that a person in their 50s should spend 50% of their total exercise time on strength training and 50% on cardio. By age 60, this scale should be 60% strength and 40% cardio. By age 70, cardio should only make up 30% of your exercise.
All the experts I spoke to agree that pain should never be ignored — and it’s never a good idea to go through pain without seeing your doctor. However, Finkelstein noted that most GPs are not well trained in exercise physiology. For specific recommendations regarding exercise regimens, it is best to see a physiatrist, who specializes in physical medicine and rehabilitation or a certified physical trainer.
“I wish we were all better trained for this, because it is so important,” Finkelstein said.
Complicating matters further, conversations about how to maintain muscle mass, bone health, aerobic capacity and cardiovascular fitness take more time than the average physician can spend with his or her patients. Many people fill this gap with advice from online fitness influencers.
Cultivate realistic expectations for Agea job
Finkelstein is concerned about the influence of the media — especially social media, with its legions of health and anti-aging influencers. “Take these supplements, do this exercise program, join this fitness routine: you name it, people are offering it,” she said. “I worry a lot about that in terms of the reliability of these people and the science behind what they offer, and people being susceptible to that because you want to do what you can to stay healthy and young.”
Popular media also likes to highlight “super old people” – people whose mental and/or physical abilities are comparable to people 20 to 30 years younger. While it is good to see, for example, an 87-year-old running a marathon, this may lead to false expectations about normal aging. Superagers are rare. Only about 10% of the general population meet all criteria for inclusion in this category.
In other words, it’s not very realistic for those of middle age or older to think that we will achieve our best forever. As experts constantly point out, the best way to exercise as we age is realistic and adaptable. A runner who adapts to the changes in his aging body and trains effectively may still be able to run the Boston Marathon, but the time it takes him to cross the finish line will necessarily be longer.
Part of the problem may be optimism bias. While we may logically understand that objects change, we do not believe that we actually change. Maybe it’s because we live in a culture obsessed not only with longevity, but also with looking younger. The number of cosmetic procedures she has had By 42.5% globally Over the past four years, Americans have spent an estimated $20 billion for plastic surgery In 2024.
“In our society, we have a big problem accepting the fact that things will change,” Leipzig said. “People are generally better off than they ever were if they are lucky enough to be able to take care of their needs, but it leads them to believe they will never die. It leads to ageism.”
And here’s the problem: Caring too much about how “younger” you are for your age is just another form of bias — one that you can hold against yourself in the future. The phrase “50 is the new 30” simply confirms our misconception that being healthy means not aging at all. It would be better to remind ourselves from time to time that old age is a privilege; That “50 is 50” and “80 is 80” – and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.