My 89 year old mother with 10 month old, great-granddaughter, Charlotte.
When I was training for my first triathlon in 2008, at age 52, I often asked myself what on earth I was doing! Certainly, I was not aging gracefully. Was this an age denial thing? Whatever it was, I was still having fun and that's what kept me going. But as the race was drawing nearer, I was getting very nervous. Could I actually pull this off? The triathlon class I was taking at the YMCA had a coach who always seemed to know how to put things in perspective. She told us (many were in their middle aged years and also was about to do their first triathlon), "If you start to panic race day morning remember this: Most people your age are still in bed (triathlons usually start at 7 AM on a week-end day)." That did seem to put it all in perspective. We we were all there to accomplish something great in our fitness world. So what if we were age defiant. We're going out kicking and screaming VS laying on a couch. There's solid evidence that exercise is the best fountain of youth fix out there. Along with a healthy diet, of course.
A great way to measure how you are doing in the healthy living department, is to take the RealAge test. This is a fantastic tool! It may take 20 minutes or so to answer all the questions, but it'll be the most interesting 20 minutes you've probably ever had in test taking. Click on the link below and start this awesome adventure. You'll be asked a variety of questions that starts with your family history, then your history, current health habits (or lack thereof), etc. If you have your last blood cholesterol and blood pressure numbers, get them out for this test. Otherwise, you can answer that you don't know. You will see two numbers at the top of your screen throughout the test. One number never changes and that is your biological age. The other number will fluctuate up and down as you take the test. This number is called your "RealAge". Although you cannot change the day you were born, much as we'd like to sometimes, your RealAge is greatly affected by what you do or don't do. After plugging in my family history and all my borderline cholesterol and blood pressure medicines, health history and yes, even not so great dietary habits, the exercise portion came up next...and was last on the test. Before this exercise portion, my RealAge was about three years older than I actually was. By the time I finished the exercise portion, my RealAge had dropped to several months younger than my biological age. It was absolutely AMAZING how plugging in those hours of exercises and types of exercise, etc., shaved those years off. AND....it showed me that if I fixed my dietary habits and ate healthier, I could have off even more years. It was a real eye opener. The test is FREE, by the way...so there is no excuse not to do it. AND...you can lay on the couch with a laptop or iPad to do it! So what are you waiting for.... Curl up on the sofa with a cup of coffee and get started on your "Fountain of Youth". Here is the link:
Another thing that keeps us young...Routine tests to stop diseases in their tracks. Not every disease has a test and ovarian cancer is one of them. If you haven't already, will you help me help researches who are very close to developing a routine blood test to detect this silent killer in its' early stages when treatment is 98% effective? Here is the link to my fund raising page:
Your donation will be MUCH appreciated! Thank you so much,
Lynn
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