Forever Young - Body and Mind and Spirit

Community Comments

It’s dinnertime in Tomorrowville and the age-defying baby boomers are trying to eat their way to a longer, better life.

The Smiths dine on fiber and Vitamin B-rich lentils, prepared with heart-healthy garlic and flaxseed oil. This lightly sautéed main course (overcooking decreases vitamin load) is sprinkled with blood sugar-stabilizing cinnamon. Also on the table is a wide array of antioxidant-rich berries, as well as toxin-fighting cruciferous veggies. The whole meal is washed down with ultra-purified water and a doctor-sanctioned glass of red wine.

Meanwhile, the Joneses have opted out of cooking. Their anti-aging regimen calls for a dinner of high-protein, vitamin-rich spirulina food bars that are enhanced with human growth hormone. They’ll toast each other with life-extending goji juice.

Welcome to the dinner table of the future, where age-battling baby boomers broaden the notion of healthy eating, using everything from peer-reviewed, high-powered research studies to obscure Himalayan hippie foods.

According to demographers and gerontologists, baby boomers’ focus on optimal health is a good thing, since they are expected to live longer and will want to enhance the quality of that longer life. But living longer also means boomers will grapple longer with chronic ailments that have no foreseeable cure, ailments such as Alzheimer’s, arthritis or diabetes that aging experts say will haunt boomers and future generations. Doctors now are often able to “fix” patients after an acute illness such as a heart attack, but can they “fix” Alzheimer’s or dementia?

Dan Veto, senior vice president with Age Wave, a Bay Area-based consultancy on aging, notes that 42 percent of people 85 and older will have to contend with some form of dementia or Alzheimer’s, conditions that “don’t necessarily kill you right away, but they can rob you of the joy of life,” Veto says.

And joie de vivre is something baby boomers are demanding in their later lives. They want to be active, look marvelous and feel spiritually alive. And they’ll pay big bucks to do so. If a product, food or treatment promises to stave off Alzheimer’s or extend life, why not try it? But will longevity increasingly become a perk available primarily to people who are wealthy enough to buy new medical treatments or educated enough to ask for them? And will the proliferation of fountain of youth treatments do little more than empty the pockets of boomers and fill the pockets of others?

“Eventually, we may see even greater gaps in people’s health, says Veto. Some futuristic people even believe that in some ways you can purchase longevity. You can buy things that are not part of the typical healthcare services that will improve your life. Specialty drugs and medicines, ‘nutraceuticals,’ elective surgeries, body scans that might discover things you might not have discovered otherwise. Better forms of rehabilitation after a stroke.”

Or maybe you can purchase longevity by spending $10 for a weekly yoga class. Or by bolstering your feel-good endorphins by attending church or mending your relationship with your aging parents.

• Share
  • Digg This
  • del.icio.us
  • Newsvine
  • Facebook
  • Reddit
  • Furl It
  • !Y My Web
  • Google
• Email
• Print

Recommend This

Community Comments

Inside prospermag.com