Healthy Body: Fundamentals
NCDs
Here are the Top 5 NCDs that cause premature death in (i.e. kill) UK women 45s-65s.
1. CARDIOVASCULAR DISEASE (CVD)
Best way to avoid it: Healthy diet, regular physical activity, not smoking, managing stress.
2. CANCER:
Includes Breast (most common for women of our age), lung, and colorectal cancers.
Best way to avoid it: Regular screenings, avoiding tobacco, a healthy diet, regular physical activity, vaccination (where applicable).
3. RESPIRATORY DISEASE
Best way to avoid it: Stop smoking, reduce air pollutants, manage asthma, regular physical activity.
4. DIABETES
Best way to avoid it: Healthy diet, regular physical activity, maintaining a normal body weight, avoiding tobacco use.
5. OBESITY (AND RELATED PROBLEMS)
Actually the thing that the NHS spends most on, but is a bit further down the mortality list.
Best way to avoid it: Healthy eating habits, regular physical activity, avoiding sitting still too much.
7. OSTEOPOROSIS
(Fragile bones and an increased risk of fractures).
Best way to avoid it: Adequate calcium and Vitamin D intake (including sunlight), regular weight-bearing exercise, avoiding smoking and excessive alcohol consumption.
Yo-yo dieting is proven to exacerbate the problem
And weaving through all of this:
8. MENTAL HEALTH DISORDERS
(more about quality of life than mortality)Includes depression and anxiety.Significantly affects quality of life and increase the risk of other NCDs.Best way to avoid them: Stress management, support for mental health issues, exercise, good sleep.
The point of all that…
The list of the things that cause the issues is remarkably consistent for each NCD.
- Being Overweight or Obese
- Unhealthy Diet (Including Yo-Yo Diets)
- Physical Inactivity
- Smoking
- Poor Stress Management
- Neglecting Health Screenings
Those dances with the Devil.
If you have one of them (like excessive booze), you increase your risk.
More than one and your risk shoots up.
3 or more – you are 70%+ likely to die early from one or more of the problem issues.
If you’re in or around this age bracket – you genuinely can’t get away with it any more.
It catches up and takes away your choices.
In my late 30s early 40s, I never heard of my former school mates being ill.We’d swap tales of career, families, holidays etc; health barely came into the conversation.
We all kept in touch and I treasure that so much.
It was all fun and games until in my mid 40s – it suddenly changed.
Sarah (I’ve changed the name) was in my tutor group at school.
She wasn’t overweight, and was always active – usually working in the garden (we called her Farmer Giles).
She had 4 lovely children, kept chickens, grew her food, had a goat, I think – and there was often a pig wondering about as well as an uncountable number of dogs, cats and other pets.
I don’t think she knew how many, in the end.
(The pig liked the downstairs bathroom – if you weren’t braced for it, it was hilarious to be angrily oinked at, if you went in for a wee.)
Sarah died quite quickly from breast cancer.
She was genuinely the best of us.
We all became mortal overnight.
Around that time several other schoolfriends started chemo, a couple developed diabetes.
I was diagnosed with MS.
ME?
The fitness one.
I’ve had my fair share of dancing with the Devil, so I won’t pretend to be whiter than white – but my general lifestyle undoubtedly made my story a much healthier, less serious one than it should have been, so far.
This year it looks as though we might lose another friend from a different kind of cancer.
Sh^t got real in just a very short amount of time.
We still identify as ‘young’ and looking at the stats – we should only be about half way.
Of course you can’t prevent everything – sometimes it is just horrible luck.
But if you do get bad luck, and you live a healthy lifestyle – you’ve got more of a chance of getting through it with a good quality of life…
And if you are lucky enough to avoid the more serious problems – well, focusing on health buys you time to think about secondary concerns like fitting into your jeans.
Also health as a priority means you won’t yo-yo diet, mess with your metabolism, weaken your bones, burn yourself out and give up, so you are much more likely to fit into your jeans as a side effect, if that’s what you want.
Here’s to us all in 30+ years time, wearing fluorescent pink jeans, climbing trees, getting inappropriate tattoos and going to Glastonbury with the Grandkids.
Or great grandkids.
Action:
Identify the main NCD preventing ‘Behaviour’ that you could improve, from the list above.
If there’s more than one and you can’t decide – just pick one and write it down.