Keep your bones strong

Our bones are amazing living organisms with their own blood vessels, various cells, proteins, vitamins & minerals. Collagen proteins give them form and calcium phosphate mineral hardens and strengthens them, creating an incredible structure that is both strong & flexible, enabling us to withstand all manner of stressors as we go about our lives.
They grow and change, transform and repair themselves over & over throughout life, yet as we age the density of our bones begins to decline.

We can and should have a varied diet which contains all the right ingredients for helping to maintain healthy bone density, in particular adequate amounts of calcium are needed, found in dairy, green leafy veg, nuts, soya & boney fish such as pilchards & sardines. Vitamin D is also needed, which we can get from both food and sunlight on our skin, and vitamin C help us absorb the calcium, amongst a number of other micro nutrients, vitamins & minerals.

Yet we must also address the health of our bones through exercise, to stave off the possibility of future osteoporosis. A condition of such inadequate bone density that the risk of breaks and fractures is extremely high, or of the preliminary condition to that, known as osteopenia, were the bone density is considered too low [for the average age] but not yet at the critical stage of osteoporosis.

So which type of exercise is best to continue to stimulate strong healthy bone density? – the answer is any kind of ‘weight bearing’ exercise. It’s fair to say when we think of weight lifting or resistance exercise, we tend mostly to think of the effect it has on our muscles but the other very important reason for doing such activity is, you guessed it – for our bones!
The good news is almost all forms of exercise has a weight bearing element to it, as all movement works against gravity. So the moral of the story is; keep on moving in whatever ways you enjoy best.

– This article has been published in the May edition of Life Magazines – http://www.lifemagazines.co.uk