Best Boomer Towns Columns

Wellness Boomer Style

I’ve had the privilege of coaching mother and daughters, husbands and wives and best friends.  The success rate is much higher when you partner up for exercise, for healthier eating and for an overall healthy lifestyle.

First, let’s throw out the word diet.  It has negative connotations and people associate it right away with deprivation.  So let’s instead use the phrase healthy eating.  We need to change how we look at food and it all starts with families, says former FDA commissioner David A. Kessler, MD, author of The End of Overeating: Taking Control of the Insatiable American Appetite.  As children, if we are rewarded with treats in an effort to pacify us or get us to eat something healthy like brussel sprout, it sets off reward centers in the brain, says Kessler, creating a sense of pleasure and a desire to overeat.  Using food to brighten a child’s mood can jump-start emotional eating that carries on into adulthood.  Also if you give a child ice cream as a reward to eat brussel sprouts, it send the signal to the brain that ice cream is good and brussel sprouts are bad.  So it’s important for us to get to the root of these beliefs and toss them to the wind. We can then replace them with thoughts that serve and support us.

One good thought to use is  “I am what I eat.  I eat healthy therefore I am healthy.” This isn’t something we can change overnight.  The awareness of the beliefs we were taught and the desire to change them will take some effort, but it’s worth the life transformation that comes with reprogramming our thoughts to live healthier.

So with that being said, let me explain why having a partner makes all the difference in sticking to a healthy lifestyle.   When you live with someone and you’re both determined to eat healthy or lose some unwanted pounds together, you have a built in support system from the start.  You can shop together, cook together, find great new recipes together and enjoy eating together.  You can also make it fun and a way to share an important aspect of your lives together, being healthy and staying healthy.  Along with that, you can find outdoor activities that are fun to do and give your bodies a workout. Maybe you can join the gym together.  

Baby boomers need to keep their bodies strong to enjoy life and have energy to do all that they want to do.

If you don’t have a willing partner, join an exercise class or a walking group.  There are many groups you can find on the internet.  This can be a fun way to exercise and meet other people that will understand and appreciate what you’re doing because they’re doing it too.

So in closing, I’d like to say, if you have a partner, child or friend that you can get on this healthy living program with, by all means, recruit them.  If you choose to do it by means of a class, go for it and pat yourself on the back for making the effort. Remember, it’s your body; take care of it and it will take care of you.

Related Columns

Chilled Strawberry Soup

Lobster Race in Aiken, SC

Boomers Love Their Hair!

Stretch Your Way to Wellness

Emotional Fireworks

What is Sun Protective Clothing?

Not Done Yet - Inspiring, Empowering, Optimism and Belief in Self

10 Instant Emotional Fitness Tools

Busy Baby Boomers - Make Time for Exercise

Iowa Judges Go Too Far