Almost 70 and trying to become healthier

TorrHC
TorrHC Posts: 1 Member
in Introduce Yourself
I'll be turning seventy in July. I've just moved into a more comfortable living place and am decided to work on improving my health.
I've been a vegetarian for half my life and just been a vegan for a couple of months. The vegan diet has helped lower my blood sugar already (I just had my annual check up almost all tests improved).
Now I just have to start exercising.
This community seems like a good place to start.
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Replies

  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 34,598 Member
    Hello, and welcome to the Community!

    I've also been vegetarian most of my life (since 1974, when I was 18, until now, at 67), but never vegan.

    I'm a big fan of being active. I don't know where you are weight-wise, but both becoming more active (in my late 40s/early 50s after cancer treatment), and reaching a healthy weight (later, at 59-60), were each huge quality of life improvements for me in so, so many ways.

    If you start with some manageable, reasonably-enjoyable exercise, one that's just a slight bit of challenge to current capabilities, that'd be perfect. Too many people think they need to do some super-intense, unpleasant kind of exercise in order to have benefits, and that just isn't true. (BTW, I'm not giving this advice just because you're 70. I'm giving it because I think it's the right choice at any age, and is what I did back in my 40s/50s.)

    Exercise we enjoy (or at least tolerate well, and find convenient) has 100% more benefits than exercise we hate, procrastinate, or skip at the slightest excuse, and maybe eventually give up altogether.

    At first, start gradually, and allow some recovery days between exercise. If your exercise is somewhat technical (like strength training), learn good form so that you avoid injury. (Injury means backsliding because of detraining, so injury avoidance is important, especially at our age.)

    Making sure there's just a mild, manageable challenge is what creates fitness progress. As you get more fit, you'll find your activity of choice feeling easier. When that happens, it's time to increase the duration, frequency, intensity or even exercise type, to keep that manageable challenge in the picture.

    Keep going in that fashion, and you'll surprise yourself with your fitness improvement as time goes on, I predict!

    Best wishes!

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