Some things are inevitable on a long enough time horizon.
If you’re lucky enough to live into your 60s, 70s, and 80s (or beyond), eventually, you will see a decrease in muscle mass. Eventually, you’ll need more time to recover than you used to. Eventually, a lot of your biomarkers, including cholesterol and heart rate, will change. You won’t be able to get away with as much as you could when you were young. There’s no avoiding it. It’s inevitable.
What’s I don’t think are inevitable are aches and pains.
But I constantly hear people complain of a tweaked low back, or a cranky knee, or a tight shoulder, and then they say, “as soon as I hit 30” or “35” or “40, stuff just started falling apart.” And in fairness, that’s super common. I’d bet a lot of money that you know a lot of people in their 30s and 40s who struggle with regular aches and pains, especially around their joints.
Now, I’m not a doctor, so take this for what it’s worth… but after 13+ years of those kinds of conversations with members, when I’ve done more investigation, I can think of only two instances where a person struggled with their joints and also felt like they were doing enough stretching and mobility (both had totally different and unique situations). Nearly every other single conversation I’ve had includes the line, “I know I should stretch more.”
Now I don’t write this to make you feel bad. We’re all doing our best. And I don’t write it to suggest that you can fish oil and yoga your way out of a torn meniscus, or that doctors are quacks, or that medical interventions are unnecessary. Furthermore, I’m not saying that two TikTok videos on stretching will solve all your problems. Joint and mobility training is deeply nuanced and individualized.
What I’m saying is, when aches and pains start to pop up, don’t just throw your hands in the air and say, “well, I’m 40 now, this is how it goes.” Your problem is probably not that your tissues weren’t meant to work for more than a few decades. What’s more likely is that you just can’t get away with as much stuff at 40 as you can at 20.
Twenty-year-olds are amazing. They can drink a 6-pack of beer at 9pm, eat Taco Bell at midnight, fall asleep on a friend’s floor at 3am, wake up at 7am, sit in classrooms or at a desk or in the car for 9 hours, consume nothing but Red Bulls and Slim Jims, and come crush a workout at 5:15pm. Incredible. Your body, in early adulthood, can shake off so many poor decisions that it’s like they never even happen.
But at 41 years old, if I have more than two alcoholic drinks, my sleep completely falls apart. If I sit for 8 hours, I feel stiff. If I drink too much caffeine I get jittery. If I redline a workout, it’s going to take me probably a full two days to recover. That doesn’t mean I feel like a fragile old man. I don’t. Probably 90% of the time, I feel amazing. Every bit as good as I felt when I was in my 20s. But it does mean that the totally bananas stuff I did in my 20s that felt like no big deal feels a whole lot different now.
What I’m saying here is this: 1) training as you age should make your life continually better, not worse. 2) Take care of your joints and your ranges of motion. Anything is better than nothing. Do a youtube search for stretches for your tight body part. Stretch for 2 minutes per day. Build from there. 3) If you need specific help, find a coach (we do this stuff all the time at UPCF, and we have a great network of specialists we refer to).
Here’s to a lifetime of training and movement.