“A few key changes to our lifestyle can positively impact our health dramatically, helping us to live healthier and longer lives” – Dr Mayoni Gooneratne.
You know when you engage with an activity that was bloody difficult to organise, meant a shedload of childcare, favours back to the women who hold you, and you turn up and it’s fucking epic. And all sense of maternal doubt and guilt melt away.
Well, that was what my 3 days in Vegas represented. I was at one of the most futuristic conferences I have ever been to. And I guess that’s why I moved heaven and earth to go to it.
The LongevityFest 2022 (yes I know) has singularly tweaked my trajectory of travel. Not life-changing like when I left surgery because I knew there had to be a better way to help change health. But in a more life-affirming “hell yeah this is what I am on this earth to do” kind of way.
You see our healthcare is broken. It’s actually disease management. Health care is in fact totally different. It is the propulsion of our cumulative health in a direction of conscious decision-making to stay or become healthier. That is very very different to disease management.
You see it’s too bloody late by then.
The point of change
The biggest point of change you see is when you are feeling well. Lifestyle choices are critical to allow us to live healthier, which may sound boring or just not a feature of our life. But the thing is IT HAS TO BE. NOTHING can be more important for you and your future health. Nothing.
We are now facing a health crisis. We are living longer (lifespan) but not healthier (healthspan) and our brain health is totally uncontrolled (brain health). So you see we have a lot of work to do. And women are going to live until we are 86 (men 81!).
So, what do you want the next 30-40 years to look like? And are we women folk going to be just pushing each other around in wheelchairs?!?! I guess in this new world order we will be the only ones left?!! Lol. Time to think about how to live healthier.
The difference in a few key changes allows us to live healthier
The good news is it doesn’t need to be all or nothing. Just a few key changes. And yes, you are unlikely to want to take in the changes. But I’m going to lay them out here anyway. I guess I hope that some will stick.
We must move daily
Even if it’s a walk around the block for 10min. It’s one of the strongest links to staying fit and well into old age. But I’m not talking about living like a triathlete. That’s also been shown to drive up inflammation and potentially shorten our lifespan.
We need time to recover and heal the muscle injury that is inevitable when we exercise.
So, if all of this doesn’t sound like you’re likely to give yourself a groin strain, then brilliant. Keep doing what you do. Walk your dog, do the shopping on foot, and keep things local so you can walk places.
Food is our pharmacy
30+ different types of fruit and veg ideally a week. 20,000 chemicals in coloured fruit and veg. And all with very specific and undeniable health functions.
Not just in a ‘bit of fruit is good for you’. But WOW eating the rainbow actually alters your health and Epigenetics in a way that is totally unachievable by modern medicine. That is truly incredible.
Modern medicine can’t keep up with what nature has evolved and created for its own protection. Nature’s very own medicine cupboard supports us to live healthier.
Stress is literally going to shorten your life
Make real-life plans to step away from the laptop/ meetings/late-night emails NOW. like right now. I’m not kidding. Covid has reset the baseline level of our stress functioning at some crazy all-time high. But it isn’t coming down.
You are literally shortening your telomeres (your DNA length which will govern your lifespan). The knock-on impact on your cortisol production is phenomenal. Not in a good way.
You are bathing your cells in a cocktail of stress-laden inflammatory markers that make you more susceptible to diabetes, weight gain, cancer, and Alzheimer’s. Fab.
What are you going to do to change that?? Please do something. Anything. We owe it to only ourselves to sort this shit out.
And guess what, your boss will not be the one who wants you to cut back and deliver at a slower rate.
It’s all up to you.
Our hormones
Another non-optional extra. This is not a luxury ladies. Living with the best possible hormonal milieu is not just for people with ‘hormonal problems in menopause’. Given that perimenopause begins when you are 35 which most of us realise too late and is a significantly shorter lifespan.
Let’s wise up. Get help, and live healthier. And please ignore the GP that tells you that all is ok and that this is a normal thing women go through.
I’m talking medicine for 2023, not for 1023.
Lack of sleep kills us
Literally. It’s shortening our telomeres exponentially and, in some cases, irrevocably. This is not good.
However, by modifying things and getting deeper sleep our Epigenetics will modify how our hardware is translated so it will make chemicals
that enhance health. Bonus.
So, there we have it. I guess whenever I look at the stuff I know will help us live healthier and hopefully longer lives, it’s all the stuff we know already.
It’s just, to my mind now, backed up by irrefutable evidence that means that we can see health in a totally different way. We can control or govern our software even if our hardware is predetermined.
And that my lovelies are the key to health. You are in total control.
What decisions are you going to make?
