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It turns out a lot of the issues you have after your 40s are due to the habits you had growing up. With that in mind, here are 20 common behaviors that are doing more harm than good.
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1. Sitting Too Much
If you have a remote job or a very sedentary lifestyle, it's quite common to be sitting way more than you should. You can get away with this as a younger person—after all, school can simply add to these habits. But when you're older, you'll feel the ramifications, from poor circulation to even obesity.
2. Caffeine Reliance
Drinking coffee may become part of your daily routine—after all, the hit helps you stay awake and alert. But relying too often on caffeine will actually increase your sensitivity, which in turn impacts everything from blood pressure to heart rhythm.
3. Poor Sleep
It's pretty easy to forget about the importance of sleep growing up. This is especially the case as younger people are able to bounce back effectively from all-nighters, but this can shift when you're older as chronic poor sleep increases the risk of diseases.
4. Neglecting Prevention
Most young people don’t worry about prevention and instead focus on living in the moment. But skipping health checkups when you're generally healthy makes it more difficult to effectively treat ailments later in life.
5. Skipping Breakfast
It may feel easy enough to skip breakfast when you're growing up. But if you make this a habit, then when you're older this will disrupt your metabolism and worsen your blood sugar control, contributing to weight issues.
6. Neglecting Water
Water is another thing you want to stay on top of. Lots of young people are actually quite dehydrated and manage to get away with it, as the impact on their kidneys and blood pressure won’t be apparent until later.
7. Neglecting Strength
When it comes to working out, it's all too easy to neglect the importance of strength training. As a younger person, it's easy to maintain muscle tone with minimal daily activity, but after 40, your muscle mass and bone density will start to decline, so start training now.
8. Dental Hygiene
Most people only visit the dentist when they have an issue, whether that be a toothache or a cavity. But in reality, you want to visit the dentist regularly, even just for clean-ups. Preventive and early diagnosis is significant when it comes to dental health.
9. Under-Resting
In today’s hustle culture, it's all too common to overexert yourself. It's fun and important to stay busy when you're younger, but overcommitting without relevant rest will only accelerate the aging process.
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10. Building Resentment
It’s easy to get emotional or react angrily when things go wrong, but this baggage may not be as manageable or livable with when you're older. In fact, chronic emotional stress also contributes to higher blood pressure.
11. Highly Processed Foods
If you eat fast food regularly, then you may not see any negative consequences from the get-go. This is because your metabolism is able to compensate for the food, but this changes as you get older, as processed foods will contribute to chronic illness and weight gain.
12. Too Much Screen
It might have annoyed you growing up how often your parents would limit your screen time. However, in reality, binging shows or scrolling for hours has consequences that manifest when you're older, as blue light can disrupt melatonin production.
13. Eating Irregularly
You essentially want to have everything on a schedule of sorts, and that includes your meals. Eating irregularly with an erratic schedule will disrupt your metabolism and make you feel more tired often. This is stuff you can't get away with when you're older either.
14. Bad Shoes
For women especially, wearing high heels is just a part of being young—after all, you recover quite quickly from the aches or pains. But poor footwear in the long run contributes to chronic back and hip pains.
15. Ignoring Mental Health
Many people choose to ignore their mental health, dismissing stress or mood swings as just a part of life. But untreated anxiety or chronic stress can lead to major complications when you're older, and can impact everything from relationships to heart health.
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16. Multitasking
It's pretty common for the busy young person to have to juggle multiple responsibilities to manage their life. But it turns out constant multitasking actually reduces overall attention span and can impair your memory long-term.
17. Ignoring Sunscreen
Sunscreen is another thing you'll want to wear 24/7 as it prevents early aging and protects your skin from harsh UV exposure. This exposure will accumulate over time, and when you're older will be the reason for your wrinkles and sunspots.
18. Drinking Often
When you're young, you can get away with regular drinking and can even bounce back from hangovers without much issue. But alcohol overall affects liver function, hormonal balance, and even sleep quality, which is quite dangerous when you're older.
19. Overusing Painkillers
Taking Tylenol or Advil is a common cure-all for most pains. But you should only use them when you really need them, as long-term use increases everything from kidney damage to liver issues.
20. Neglecting Weight
It may seem like everyone in the world is obsessed with managing their weight, but it's common for younger people to all too easily shed weight or retain their physique. But as you age and your metabolism slows, it becomes even harder to lose weight, so you'll want to set daily habits now rather than later.
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