When Prevention Isn’t the Goal Anymore

Redefining healthy aging after you've collected a few diagnoses.‍ ‍

Every healthy aging article seems to start the same way:

Maintain a healthy weight.

Reduce your risk of diabetes.

Avoid high blood pressure.

Great.  Now, what about the rest of us, who have at least one or two of the most common lifestyle illnesses that become increasingly common as we age?  It sometimes feels like we skip straight from prevention to the prescription drug commercials, as if there are only two choices: perfectly healthy or seriously limited. Surely there is a middle ground. 

There’s a big gap between the content aimed at prevention and the content directed towards treatment.  You never see an ad showing a chubby woman with a walking stick climbing hills and stone steps in the Riviera, but I assure you she’s out there.  I know she is, because she was me, this summer on a Mediterranean cruise.  Sweating. Panting. Fanning myself furiously (Google “2026 European heat wave”). But still climbing. Still enjoying the views. Still out there.

That’s important to me because travel is one of my great joys, and while I have incorporated more support and less do-it-yourself into my plans, it is still quite demanding.  I've learned to adapt—taking a taxi up the steepest hill, carrying a walking stick for extra stability on steps with no railing, occasionally choosing a guided tour instead of figuring everything out myself.  Planning for 6 hours of exploring, rather than 10.  Alternating strenuous days with easier ones (beach day, anyone?). 

Most importantly, being willing to change plans if I’m just not feeling up to it. Twenty years ago, I would never have abandoned a plan, especially if I had paid for it.  Now I’ve learned that sometimes the smarter decision is to just sit in the shade with a coffee or a beer and simply enjoy where I am.

Those modifications, and a little extra planning, make a big difference.  Just as making small consistent progress on weight loss, even if I’m not close to my goal, helps.  Losing 10 or 15 pounds makes a great deal of difference to my knee. 

Prevention has given way to preservation. 

When I was younger, good health meant avoiding disease altogether. Today, it means preserving the ability to live the life I want. That's a very different goal. It's less about perfection and more about capability.  To enjoy playing 18 holes of golf. To complete the 10K race.  To lift the 20-lb carry-on bag into the overhead bin, and to make my connecting flight on time. To get to the top of that hill.  Those goals are far more motivating than “get my A1C down to 5.5”.

I haven’t given up on improving my numbers, and my odds for living longer.  But that’s not the whole game. Healthy aging isn't just about avoiding disease. For many of us, it's about refusing to let a diagnosis become the whole story.  Being able to do the things we love – that’s the goal.  By whatever means. Using whatever help we can get. 

It would be foolish to pretend I’m still thirty. 

But I can still climb that hill.