It’s easy to want to do less as we get older, but the benefits of continuing to actively exercise, pushing oneself even just a little, can be far-reaching.

Direct and indirect benefits

As well as the obvious fitness benefits, keeping up good levels of exercise can also offer:

Healthy Skin

Exercise improves circulation, bringing growth factors (thus: regeneration, because it’s replacing cells), oxygen, and nutrients to the skin. Accordingly, it can lead to healthier, more youthful-looking skin as a low-cost alternative to a lot of skincare products. That said, it also encourages good skin habits, like daily sunscreen use.

Bone Health

Weight-bearing and resistance exercises (which between them, encompasses most forms of exercise) improve bone density. This is because physical stress signals bones to strengthen, reducing the risk of fractures. This includes activities like walking, hiking, and using resistance bands or weights. Note however that it is on a “per bone” basis. So for example, hiking will improve your lower body and spine, but do nothing for your arms. On the other hand, doing a daily groceries trip on foot, if local geography makes that practicable, can do the whole body, if one is then carrying groceries home (this writer lives about 2 miles from where she buys groceries, and does this pretty much daily).

Mental Health

Exercise, especially outdoors, has well-established positive effects on mental well-being, and can relieve stress and improve mood. As a bonus, community engagement and shared experiences can enhance mental health benefits for many people—but if you prefer it as peaceful time for yourself, that’s beneficial in its own way too!

Better Sleep

Physical activity helps promote better sleep quality, which is important for so many aspects of health—because fatiguing the body through exercise can lead to a more restful night, which is often harder to achieve with age.

Visibility and Confidence

Staying active and taking on challenges (e.g. training for some event) can boost visibility in social and family settings, countering “invisibility” often felt from midlife onwards. And even if one doesn’t do those things, exercise fosters confidence and helps people carry themselves with more self-assurance, which has a lot of knock-on benefits too.

For more on all of these things, enjoy:

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Want to learn more?

You might also like to read:

Are There Any Sensible Age Limits To Exercise?

Take care!

Dr. Sam Ellis, dermatologist, explains:

Hair today; gone tomorrow

While a little peach fuzz is pretty ubiquitous, coarser hairs are less common in women especially earlier in life. However, even before menopause, such hair can be caused by main things, ranging from PCOS to genetics and more. In most cases, the underlying issue is excess androgen production, for one reason or another (i.e. there are many possible reasons, beyond the scope of this article).

Options for dealing with this include…

• Topical, such as eflornithine (e.g. Vaniqa) thins terminal hairs (those are the coarse kind); a course of 6–8 weeks continued use is needed.
• Hormonal, such as estrogen (opposes testosterone and suppresses it), progesterone (downregulates 5α-reductase, which means less serum testosterone is converted to the more powerful dihydrogen testosterone (DHT) form), and spironolactone or other testosterone-blockers; not hormones themselves, but they do what it says on the tin (block testosterone).
• Non-medical, such as electrolysis, laser, and IPL. Electrolysis works on all hair colors but takes longer; laser needs to be darker hair against paler skin* (because it works by superheating the pigment of the hair while not doing the same to the skin) but takes more treatments, and IPL is a less-effective more-convenient at-home option, that works on the same principles as laser (and so has the same color-based requirements), and simply takes even longer than laser.

*so for example:

• Black hair on white skin? Yes
• Red hair on white skin? Potentially; it depends on the level of pigmentation. But it’s probably not the best option.
• Gray/blonde hair on white skin? No
• Black hair on mid-tone skin? Yes, but a slower pace may be needed for safety
• Anything else on mid-tone skin? No
• Anything on dark skin? No

For more on all of this, enjoy:

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Want to learn more?

You might also like to read:

Too Much Or Too Little Testosterone?

Take care!

McKay Lang walks us through it:

Step by Step

Breathing exercise:

• Place your hands on your lower abdomen.
• Take three deep breaths, focusing on body tension in the shoulders and neck… And release.

Shoulder squeeze:

• With your hands on your hips, inhale and squeeze your shoulders upwards.
• Hold your breath for 3–4 seconds, then exhale.
• Repeat two more times, holding the squeeze a little longer each time.

Upper shoulder massage:

• Massage your upper shoulder muscles to release tension stored there.

Overhead arm stretch:

• Raise your arms above your head, clasping each elbow with the opposite hand.
• Inhale deeply, stretch upwards, then exhale and release.
• Repeat, alternating elbows.

Neck and head push:

• Place your palms on the back of the head, and push your head into your hands (and vice versa, because of Newton’s Third Law of Motion).
• Do the same sideways (one side and then the other), to engage the other neck muscles.

Cool down:

• Gently unclasp your hands, bring your head upright, and massage your muscles. And breathe.

For variations and a visual demonstration of all, enjoy:

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Want to learn more?

You might also like to read:

6 Ways To Look After Your Back

Take care!