Harmful habits that erase your youthful look highlight mistakes you make daily, whether routinely or casually. Some of these harmful habits that erase your youthful look include smoking tobacco, poor sleep, unhealthy eating, inadequate exercise, too much sun exposure, and more.
Smoking tobacco increases your chances of getting cancer, besides ending up with wrinkled and sagging skin at a younger age. This is because smoking reduces blood flow that carries vital nutrients like oxygen to the surface of your skin, and may also slow your body’s production of collagen. Therefore, talk to your doctor about how to break this habit.
Eating healthy and nutritious foods helps prevent heart disease, diabetes, and other illnesses that drain your youthful energy. Reflect on the heart-healthy Mediterranean diet that consists of healthy fats from foods like fish, nuts, olive oil, and avocado. Also beneficial are a variety of whole grains, fruits, and vegetables. Eating healthy is also good for your brain, though you have to cut back a little on fatty red meat.
Regular exercise is a great way to stay, feel, and look young. Regular physical activity strengthens your muscles, boosts your energy, and improves your mood. Getting off your couch and moving around keeps your brain sharp and reduces the risk of age-related diseases such as heart disease. The good news is that you don’t need to go to a gym or join a football team. All you need is either some 30 minutes brisk walking, garden work, or even dancing, on most days of the week, for that youthful glow.
If you don’t get enough sleep, your skin is the worse for it. Your skin can start to wrinkle and sag early. That’s in part because your body releases more cortisol, a “stress hormone,” during rest time. This hormone breaks down the collagen that keeps your skin radiant, smooth, and elastic. Therefore, plan a quiet, soothing bedtime ritual with regular hours, and avoid caffeine, alcoholic drinks, and electronics before going to bed.
Soaking up too much sun can damage your skin, though some sunlight is good for you. Likewise, too many UV rays may cause your body to make too much of a protein called elastin. This thickens and roughens your skin, with deep wrinkles and varied age spots. So, if you must be in direct sun, wear hats, long sleeves, and sunglasses. Also, use a “broad-spectrum” sunscreen with SPF 30 or higher.
If you don’t moisturize, your skin dries out, looking rough and scaly, making you look older. So when you wash your skin, once or twice daily, try to be gentle and avoid scrubbing to avoid irritating it. Besides, try to use a mild cleanser without alcohol or other ingredients that could inflame, roughen, or dry out your skin. After washing, moisturize with cream twice a day to help seal in moisture that helps you look youthful.
When you squint or frown, you crease up the skin on your face, which over time can lead to lines and wrinkles. Realistically, any facial habit you make frequently over time can be a problem. Hence, if you work outside regularly, a pair of sunglasses might keep you from squinting and help prevent the “crow’s feet” that can develop on the outside corners of your eyes. You may also want to get a large-brimmed hat to prevent the sun from entering your eyes.
Keeping up the social network with your friends and family can help you stay young at heart and boost your emotional, mental, and physical health, too. It helps stave off the blues, anxiety, depression, and the dementia linked to old age, including Alzheimer’s disease. And when you look for a community, remember, it’s the quality of your social connections that matters, not the quantity.
It’s important to control and manage your blood pressure with diet, exercise, and medication. High blood pressure raises your risk of age-related problems like vascular dementia and Alzheimer’s disease, probably because it damages the tiny blood vessels in your brain. So being able to control your blood pressure will slow or prevent brain decline, like dementia and Alzheimer’s disease.
When you shut down on kindness, your body also doesn’t release the “pleasure hormones”, or endorphins linked with showing kindness to others. But when you spend money on other people or show empathy, you experience calmness, pleasure, and happiness. The connection you feel when you help someone often elicits repetition of such kindness. This, in turn, makes you even calmer and happier. Your emotional excitement lowers stress and may even help your heart health and immune system against germs.
Don’t miss your medical checkup. You should see your doctor for a physical exam every year after age 50. Your doctor will check your blood pressure, cholesterol, and blood sugar. High levels of BP, cholesterol, and blood sugar can lead to heart disease, dementia, and other age-related illnesses. And signs of mental decline, like memory problems, may also be checked, and treatment can start to address them.