Achieving Wellness After 50!
By Gayle Carson, Ed.D., CSP, CPCM

The Golden Years! Where are they? Remember when you thought that once you neared retirement, everything would be just keen and peachy? Now each day seems to bring another ache or pain, and you begin to feel your bones creak when you get up and stiffness as you begin to move.

Seriously however, staying healthy as you age, is not easy. But it’s not impossible. You just have to follow some basic principles and then do a lot of hoping that everything falls into place. Sometimes even with everything you do, a major illness occurs. And you have no control over it at all.

What do you do? Well if you are in strong physical and mental shape to begin with, it helps. You will find that the strength you have body wise, combined with the right “head thinking” gives you a survival rate far longer than others. In many cases, not only will you survive defying doctor’s predictions, but you will outpace many of your friends and acquaintances.

In addition, the more positive an outlook you have, the more endorphins you have released in your body, and the more resistant you will be to all things attaching to your system. So, let’s get off the down and dismal and on to what we can do.

The fact that you keep active and involved probably does as much for you as anything else. Being around friends and people who support you and with whom you have common interests, gives you a warm and safe feeling. They keep you interested as well as interesting. You share ideas and thoughts and bond in a unique way that is a separate place of its own.

If you have a family who visits, grandchildren who love you, friends who check in, people who depend on you and causes you believe in, you will have more purpose and reason to make sure you are healthy.

So here is what you must do every day to achieve the wellness and health we all want after 50.

1. Take all medication on time every day and monitor body functions that you need to.
    
2. Use appropriate supplements to bolster your immune system. Be sure they don’t interfere with any of the medications you are on.
    
3. Move every day. Swimming and walking are the two easiest things on your joints. Weight training can be done in a seated position if necessary. You can move shoulders, ankles, the neck and stretch your arms and torso without too much trouble.
    
4. Keep your mind sharp. Do puzzles, learn a new skill, try a computer game, but learn something new every day. With the speed of change we have today, it shouldn’t be hard to find something you don’t know.
    
5. Hang around positive people. You won’t have any trouble finding people who will tell you what you can’t do. Find those who will tell you what you can—even if they’re under the age of eight. They believe you can do anything!
    
6. Appreciate what you do have. You may not be as fast or energetic as you were at 30, or you may be even better. Many people are actually healthier, saner and more at peace than back in their early days.
    
7. Lastly, many times wellness is a state of mind. If you think you are healthy, live your life the way you want, are mentally alert and inquisitive, enjoy the people around you and they enjoy you, you have achieved wellness.

Happiness has no age limits, so why not spend your “golden years” the best way you can in the most extraordinary manner enjoying fantastic people, places and health.