How to Create a New Healthier You Over Fifty

By Juliette Crane

As your body ages, it undergoes a number of changes such as slowed metabolism and a greater tendency to gain weight. Your taste and smell deteriorate slightly, making it easier to eat foods you may once have disliked. Your ability to digest food is also affected because less stomach acid and saliva is produced as we age. This can affect your body's ability to absorb nutrients and vitamin and mineral deficiency can result. The body's ability to produce enzymes and coenzymes also declines as we age. Fortunately, there are some simple things you can do to improve or maintain your good health.

Firstly, if you want the stamina to live well, it is important to eat a good breakfast. Many people are fully aware of the importance of breakfast and have in the past made sure their families ate properly before they started their day. You may not do the same thing for yourself once the children have grown up and left home. Breakfast can be easy and healthy. The combination of fruit, oatmeal, toast and juice or a hot drink, can provide an excellent and balanced start to the day.

Fruit should be your first choice for a mid morning snack. Full of vitamins, minerals and antioxidants as well as high in vitamins, fruit is a great immune system booster. Smaller meals eaten more frequently, whether fruit or otherwise, make digestion easier and speed up metabolism making it less likely that you will gain weight as you age. Frequent, small meals also help to control blood sugar levels and prevent hunger.

Sensible lunches include salads, wraps and soups. Watch out for creamed soups. Many boomers notice that milk products tend to create a multitude of flatulence. The reason may be simple, the older that people become, the less of the enzyme lactase they create to digest the milk sugar. This sits in the stomach and creates all sorts of distress from gas to diarrhea. Even though you may already realize that milk creates digestive problems, don't forget creamy dressings and creamed soups. These sneaky devils contain hidden milk that creeps up to bite you later. Aged cheese, over 60 days, contains very little lactose due to the bacteria that consumes it when the cheese is made. Cheese is the best route to get the needed calcium if you have lactose intolerance.

Watch out for food allergies you never knew you had. Just like lactose intolerance, many food allergies aren't allergies at all but the body's inability to process certain foods. Gluten intolerance plays havoc on bodies and is seldom suspected until some bright physician asks just the right questions. Gluten is found in wheat and grain products like bread and vinegar.

To make sure your body is supplied with all the essential vitamins and minerals it needs to properly function, it is important to take a good quality daily supplement. Many companies sell combination of vitamins and minerals designed specifically for older people. Capsules are more easily absorbed than tablets. You can also purchase enzymes and coenzymes. CoQ10 is a coenzyme that is usually made by the human body and has been found to benefit people with damaged hearts, the onset of Alzheimer's or taking cholesterol lowering medication.

Youth can often provide a grace period during which we don't suffer the full consequences of bad eating. However, as we age, our bodies can seem to turn on us and we don't get away with nearly as much. Processed sugar is a serious health hazard which you need to minimize increasingly as you age. Sugar should only be eaten in the form of fruit. Along with some daily exercise, a healthy diet will leave you feeling healthier and more energetic.

More than anything, it is important to be positive, happy and enjoy life. Maintain an active life and stay interested in people and life in general. By simply changing your approach to eating, you can develop a new outlook to life. You can learn new healthier recipes, create interesting healthy menus and begin to enjoy food in a different way. Your generation changed the way youth was viewed and experienced. Are you ready to change the future of aging? - 31875

About the Author:

Sign Up for our Free Newsletter

Enter email address here