Stopping the clock, How to age slowly in a fast-paced life

Susan B. Roberts, Ph.D.

It starts with a few wrinkles in your mid-20s. Some get spooked by these first visible signs of aging; for most, it’s no big deal. You feel fine. You just don’t look quite so fresh anymore.

By age 35 or 40, weight gain and an increasingly busy life suddenly make you aware you’re no longer young, even if you’re not yet old.

By 50, it is no longer whether you are aging, but how you are doing, and how you are doing compared to others. At this watershed age, appearance is incredibly variable. You can look anything from 40 to 60, depending on your genes and lifestyle.

As a professor of nutrition and psychiatry at Tufts University, I research aging and ways to slow it down. As a newly-minted 50-year-old, I also have the opportunity to experience firsthand what I study in my laboratory.

Research teaches me that aging is universal, but we can influence how quickly we get there. My personal experience teaches me that although aging brings wisdom, love and other good things, the downsides are life-altering enough that I’m going to do whatever it takes to delay them.

“Aging is not for sissies,” says Herbert Grossman, 81, of Long Island, N.Y. “I have had a number of procedures, including the loss of one kidney to cancer, two other bouts with cancer, [I] take a half-dozen medications daily and am now on dialysis. If I had known what was coming, and especially how to prevent it, I definitely would have done more when I was younger.

“It’s not that I’m not happy to be alive still,” he adds, “but I miss being able to travel and do things I did with such ease when I was younger and healthier. I’ve had to give up so many things that used to be my life, and now just getting up each morning becomes harder and harder.”

Yet some people have it easier. At high school reunions, there are always the envied few who look 10 years younger and are running marathons and starting new careers.

As he approaches 50, Paul Fuss of Weymouth, Mass., seems set on this easier path. In his case, good genes may be helping him along.

“Two of my grandparents did really well and one lived to be 100,” he says. “They were healthy until a very old age long before we knew how to eat well, so I attribute a lot of my own good fortune to cooperative genes.”

But what should you do if your genes are not so cooperative? How exactly do you make your own good fortune when it comes to aging slowly in a fast-paced life?

We don’t have all the answers yet, but diet is emerging as one of the major factors. Eating well for lifelong health isn’t mere guesswork anymore; an increasingly solid body of research sees direct links between the food you eat and the cumulative damage to your DNA and body structures at the heart of the aging process.

Here are three simple ways to delay the process of biological aging and help you feel younger for longer.

Avoid weight gain — or, if you need to, get rid of excess pounds and keep them off. Just a few surplus pounds carry significant aging and health risks. Being substantially overweight increases your risks for permanent oxidative damage in DNA, and raises the likelihood of suffering from diseases, like diabetes, osteoarthritis and several kinds of cancers.

As a scientist researching ways to make aging and weight loss easier, I’m frequently asked to share tips. My current favorite is very simple: Eat more fiber, a lot more, especially cereal fiber. In our research studies at Tufts, volunteers who eat between 40 and 50 grams of fiber per day find weight control easier and feel fuller and more satisfied that those who eat less.

The high fiber cereals available in any supermarket are a great place to start to increase your fiber intake. Be careful to ramp up your fiber intake slowly, and make sure to drink more water or other fluids at the same time to avoid the bloating, constipation or diarrhea that can result from a too-rapid increase in fiber consumption.

Eat some protection daily. Relying on commercial supplements for your vitamins and minerals isn’t good enough. Fruits, vegetables and whole grains offer so much more. They contain natural antioxidants and other substances not found in pills that protect against a range of diseases, including breast, prostate and lung cancers.

Daily helpings of dark green, orange and red vegetables are key elements of your protection against aging. They guard your DNA and body structures to keep you metabolically and physically younger, and have been shown to be strongly protective against the degenerative diseases so common in later life. Fruits have many of the same valuable properties, as do whole grains — but not the refined carbohydrate products made from them.

Four to five cups of a combination of vegetables and fruits is a good goal, with amounts of whole grains depending on your size, age and physical activity. Personalized recommendations that meet national standards for healthy eating are now available online at www.mypyramid.gov.

Exercise. I’m a fan of exercise. Without the 30-60 minutes of exercise I try to do daily, I’m sure I wouldn’t be coping as well with my body’s aging agenda. Virtually everyone who can fit in these recommended amounts of physical activity will be healthier and stronger in years ahead. A gym membership is great way to get your daily dose, of course, but there are so many other ways to get some activity — speed walking when you go out, refusing to take the elevator at work, dancing or playing vigorous games with your kids. Exercise is important, and doesn’t have to take a huge amount of time out of an already-busy life.

In the end, aging is a journey that we all take. Our bodies, like our cars, will last longer if we look after them well. Whether we travel through our later years in a 20-year-old jalopy that shows its age or a well-kept Mercedes sedan is something we no longer have to leave to fate.

Dr. Susan B. Roberts, Ph.D., is a professor of nutrition and professor of psychiatry at Tufts University. She conducts studies on delaying aging and weight control. She welcomes inquiries for her current study on calorie restriction and aging. If you are between the ages of 25-45 and would like to consider volunteering, please contact her at CALERIE@tufts.edu or 617-556-3125.