Teenage years are the most important for laying down bones for the rest of your life.
Think of your bones as a “bank” where you “deposit” and “withdraw” bone tissue.
During your childhood and teenage years, new bone is added to the skeleton faster than old bone is removed As a result, your bones become larger, heavier, and denser.
This continues until around age 20. However after age 30, bone withdrawals can begin to go faster than deposits. After the menopause this increases further.
How to maximise healthy bones
- Weight bearing exercise – running, jumping, carrying things – plank
- Bones are made of a mixture of collagen and calcium, plus magnesium, vitamin D and vitamin K
- Found in leafy greens, grass fed meat, full fat dairy, nuts and seeds, tinned fish with bones, sunlight on skin, vitamin C rich foods such as berries
- Fat which helps moves minerals into bones – so avoid low fat
- Sufficient sleep which promotes growth hormone
How to make poor bones
- Drink fizzy drinks which contain phosphoric acid which unbalances calcium
- Avoid sunlight on the skin or slather on too much sun screen
- Eat a low fat diet
- Drink a lot of caffeine which interferes with calcium absorption
There is a real concern that in digital age of moving less and being indoors more, plus over- use of sunscreens, that bone health will decline.
Whatseatingyou.co.uk