Strong Bones, Resilient Lives | Building Lifelong Strength Before Puberty | Ep. 291

In this episode of The Aging Well Podcast, Dr. Jeff Armstrong and cohost Corbin Bruton explore why one of the most critical windows for building a strong, resilient body occurs before puberty. The truth is, by the time most people start thinking about bone health—it's already late in the game.Dr. Armstrong breaks down how bone density, muscular strength, and foundational movement patterns are largely formed during childhood and adolescence—and why this matters for long-term health, mobility, and fracture prevention later in life. They discuss how early physical activity, nutrition, and strength-based play lay the groundwork for aging well, and how modern childhood culture (sedentary lifestyles, early specialization, screen time) threatens that process.This conversation is for parents, educators, and anyone interested in building—or rebuilding—a foundation for lifelong strength.

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
What does it mean to age well and when do we begin aging well?
We believe that aging well begins in childhood, perhaps
even before. Welcome to the Aging Well
Podcast where we explore the science stories and strategies
behind living a longer, healthier, and more purposeful
life. I am your host Doctor Jeff
Armstrong, an exercise physiologist with a passion for

(00:21):
making science simple and life better as we age, with my Co
host Corbin Bruton. In this episode we're talking
about something few people associate with aging well, bone
strength in childhood. The reality is that what happens
before puberty in terms of movement, strength and nutrition
sets the stage for physical resilience decades down the

(00:43):
line. If we want to age well, we have
to build strong bones early. The Aging Well podcast
encourages informed decision making, and always consult your
physician and scientific literature when making decisions
about your health. Doctor Armstrong When people
think about aging and bone health, they usually picture

(01:03):
osteoporosis in older adults. Why are you saying it starts in
childhood? Well, I think it's pretty well
established that our bone density is developed in our teen
years for women in particular, you know if you want to reduce
the risk of osteoporosis in youradvanced years is do as much

(01:25):
weight bearing activity prior tothe first menses.
So the more bone mineral densitywe have, the more we have to
lose as we age is, you know, osteoclast osteoblast activity
begins to decline as we age. We know that about 90% of our
bone density is developed by theage of 18.
So if you your bone mineral density isn't build up early,

(01:48):
you're ending up having to play catch up and that's a lot harder
as we get older. And it's also, you know, a
matter now you have to manage your decline much more
sensitively because we we don't have as much that we can lose
from. And so it's important to
remember the bones are living tissue.

(02:08):
They're responsive to load. They're responsive to the
nutrition that we get or don't get, and they're also responsive
to hormones. And So what we do early in life
is going to establish the habitsand the structure that is either
going to make or break our bones, pun intended, there as we

(02:28):
age. All right, so what's getting in
the way of kids building strong bones today?
Well, I think a lot of it's pretty obvious.
I mean, kids are sitting on their butt a lot more now than
they did decades ago. Their lives have been taken over
by screen time. You know, they're spending a lot
more time on computers. They're spending a lot more
time, you know, scrolling on their phones.

(02:51):
Especially since COVID, there's been a lot more, you know, kids
interacting via the Internet as opposed to kind of face to face.
You're not walking or biking over to your friend's house
anymore. You're just getting on your
computer and interacting with them.
We also live in a very frightened society these days,
and kids aren't playing outdoors.

(03:13):
I grew up in an era in the 60s and 70s where parents kicked you
out of the house. You weren't supposed to come
home until, you know, it was dinner time.
And even then, you know, our parents would be calling for us
and we pretend not to hear our moms so that we can keep
playing. And often times we were told,
you know, don't come home until the streetlights come on.
I know that sounds harsh. And I think the younger

(03:34):
generation now is like, oh, yourparents were so mean to you.
They, you know, they didn't careabout you.
And it was very much the opposite.
They wanted us outside. They wanted us to get as much
activity as possible. And there's a lot less free
movement and physical variety inkids, even if they're getting
adequate PE in school, they're not getting as much movement as

(03:56):
they should. And you know, you look at recess
time in schools, they're they'renot forcing kids to be outside
and just simply playing. We didn't have phones with us or
other things that we could do during recess time.
We had the monkey bars that wereover the asphalt.
And, you know, you played and you played hard during that

(04:17):
period of time. You know, we got to school
early. We'd play.
So kids have a lot less variety in their physical activity and
not moving as much. They're discouraged from moving.
And there's also this continued fear and misinformation about
kids doing strength training. And I would also say that early
sports specialization doesn't necessarily help the problem

(04:40):
either. You know, these kids are playing
their sports a lot more, They'replaying a singular sport a lot
more. They're not getting kind of a
more balanced strength development, balanced bone
development, and they're not getting resistance training
activity or conditioning type ofactivities when all they're

(05:01):
doing is playing the same game. That's really interesting.
It's almost like you're suggesting instead of going down
one path, have them be involved in as many sports as possible to
experience is is much movement, different varieties of movement
as possible because that helps with that development versus

(05:24):
this one sport hyper focus just training that way.
No, it's it's yeah, it's interesting.
I also think it's really interesting, I could not agree
with you that we live in a hyper, a hyper fearful society.

(05:44):
I know like I have a lot of friends roughly my age and when
we were younger we would go bikeriding as well.
But they don't want their kids to go bike riding at the same
age that we were because they'reafraid of all kinds of stuff.
And even getting their kids involved in sports.
I've, I've heard some of my friends and loved ones say like,

(06:07):
I don't want them to experience this sport because I don't want
them to experience the culture of that.
And I'm like, what? That's such a weird concept for
me, but it, but I guess it does play a factor of, of getting
kids involved and getting them active.
That's just something I noticed.So I, I think it's really cool

(06:29):
that you brought that up and kind of recognized that that
fearful culture that we kind of live in, in today's day and age
as well. Well, and what you mentioned
about not wanting them to experience that culture, well,
what are you doing about that culture?
Why don't you step up and be a coach?

(06:49):
Why don't you involve yourself in that sport, communicate with
the coaches and and stand to thenegative culture?
I remember, I mean, there were times when my son was playing
football that I literally went up to the coaches after practice
and said we're done because thisis bullshit.
I'm not going to have. And, you know, usually, you
know, the coach is backpedaled and and eventually, you know,

(07:10):
you kind of get some change in there or, you know, OK, well,
the kid doesn't like that sport.They've tried it.
They can move on to something else.
But there is strong evidence that, you know, it's more
detrimental to a child to specialize in a sport field
before the age of 12 than it is beneficial for them.
And so many of these parents, I think parents are the problem

(07:32):
with the culture. As well.
You know, so many of these parents think that by their kid
participating in the club sport that they're going to, you know,
you spend 10s of thousands of dollars a year to get your kid a
scholarship that is going to be less than that for four years.
It makes absolutely no sense other than maybe you are

(07:53):
boosting your own insecurities by, you know, living vicariously
through your child. So what are some kind of
activities that actually help build bone density in kids?
Well, it goes back to Wolf's law, which you know, I'm sure
you hopefully remember from youranatomy and Physiology days and

(08:13):
certainly from Physiology of exercise.
But Wolf's law basically states that the bone is going to
develop or harden itself in response to stresses applied to
it. And so the more weight bearing
activity that we're doing, activities that provide some
level impact and resistance are going to be the best activities

(08:33):
for bone development. So this is going to be again,
weight bearing exercises, just simply walking, running, doing
those types of things. But activities like jumping,
sprinting, climbing, lifting, anything where the muscle is
having to contract against the bone is going to have the
benefit of putting down more bone mineral in the area where

(08:54):
that muscle attaches to the bone.
And as well the load is the bodyis receiving the impact due to
gravity is going to help strengthen that bone.
And so body weight exercises, gymnastics are great activities
for young kids. Calisthenics, even just free
play, getting out and playing like kids naturally want to play

(09:15):
is going to have a benefit of increasing bone mineral density.
And so we want to load the skeleton in a variety of
different ways and in progressive ways.
We don't want to overload the bone too quickly.
I mean, you're not going to put a £500 barbell on the back of
your 12 year old and say, OK, squat it because you're going to
break the bones and you run thatrisk of damaging the bone in the

(09:39):
process. And I know that's one of the
biggest concerns and it's a misapplied concern with
resistance training and prepubescent kids or kids who
have not completed their lung bone growth is if they're going
to damage the epiphyseal plate. And the epiphyseal plate is the
area in the bone where the long bone grows.
And yes, if that gets damaged, it's going to inhibit the long

(10:04):
bone development for a period oftime until that cartilage heals.
And cartilage heals much slower than bone.
But the reality is if child is training under the appropriate
loads, with appropriate technique, under the appropriate
supervision, that risk of damaging the epiphyseal plate is
negligible. It's there's just no chance of

(10:24):
that. It really comes down to just
stupid training, doing stupid things in the gym that would
cause somebody to hurt, that thebenefits of doing that
resistance training far, far outweigh any of the risks that
can come from it. And so the important idea with
loading the bone in pre pubescent kids is doing

(10:46):
consistent activity, progressingthat overtime, maintaining
technique as we load the bone, but doing as much activity that
is going to impact the bone development as possible.
If you're enjoying the Aging Well podcast, be sure to like,
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(11:08):
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Thank you. And now back to the podcast.

(11:30):
As you were bringing up Wolf's Law and asking if I remember it
from, you know, over 10 years ago, I did, I started thinking
about it. And the one thing I definitely
remember from that course and that subject is we, we studied
gymnasts and their bone density was higher than the average

(11:55):
athletes. So that, that is the one thing
I, I do remember from you teaching Wolf's Law.
And so I, I think it, I think itis important those calisthenics,
body weight gymnastics style exercise if we want to increase
the bone density just based off of what was taught in that

(12:16):
moment, the, the data was very clear that gymnasts had an
insane amount of bone density. Pretty cool that always that,
that always stuck with me. So one thing though, not just
calisthenics, but strength training in general.
Strength training still gets a really bad rap when it comes to

(12:37):
kids. I guess the question is, is it
safe? And what do parents need to know
when they're having their kids perform strength training?
I think the important thing to know is A, it needs to be
supervised, B, it needs to be age appropriate.
I've always taught that resistance training and it's

(12:57):
important we kind of different strength training can come in a
lot of different forms. Weight training is just one way
that we can train the strength and the bone mineral density of
a child. Any kind of resistance movement
is going to benefit the muscle and the bone.
And so I've always taught that resistance training should start
as soon as that child pops out of the womb.

(13:19):
As soon as you're born, you should be doing things that are
gonna be loading the muscle. And you think about when you
play with a baby, you grab theirfeet, they're immediately and
just intuitively going to push against your hands.
That's resistance training. And so the last thing we want to
do with a newborn is swaddle them up in a blanket and leave
them in a crib for long periods of time because they're not

(13:41):
going to develop. We want them crawling, we want
them climbing, we want them falling.
We want them to be moving so that they can develop naturally.
And so just getting kids moving is going to be the first step.
And then as a child gets older, resistance training doesn't have

(14:02):
to be weights. It could begin to be just body
weight, calisthenics, types of movements, doing push ups, pull
ups, climbing the ropes in PE, you know, jumping, running,
doing those types of activities are going to help.
And then eventually we can beginto introduce weight training to
the developing child. And there's no age that that is

(14:24):
not ideal. It really depends on the child.
I know you know, my friend CoreyMetzger, who is the strength and
conditioning coach at Western Oregon University, her daughter
Reba has pretty much grown up inthe the weight room and she will
just naturally pick up weights and start doing the stuff that
the athletes are doing. That's not Corey pushing it on

(14:44):
her or any of that kind of stuff.
It's just kid experiences it. They get interested in it, they
try it, they might do it for a while and then lose interest.
So you just let them do what interest them and as they
express that interest, then support that interest.
If they want to start lifting weights, start teaching them the
technique. Teach them the basic 5 movement
patterns. Teach them how to do a proper

(15:06):
squat. Teach them how to do a hip
hinge. Teach them how to, I mean, doing
a push up is going to teach themhow to bench press.
You know, you're doing that horizontal push, doing overhead
movement, doing pulls, doing a lot of carries.
Get your kid carrying the groceries in from the car and
they might only be able to carrya small bag at a time, but you
start adding more and more groceries over time, that kid is

(15:27):
going to get stronger. They're going to be able to do
more work. And so as long as they can
execute the movement patterns inproper technique under an
appropriate load and do it with interest, then let them lift if
they're not interested. Don't force them if they're not
of the emotional maturity to be able to train, you know, they

(15:50):
just want to play grab ass in the gym all the time.
That's not benefiting them. So you want to be doing it in a
way that's most supervised and most age appropriate.
And really when we're looking atresistance training, the risk of
injury is dramatically lower than it is in most sport.
And by doing resistance training, you are going to

(16:11):
reduce the risk of injury in those sport.
You know, you look at the risk of ACL tears in females, once
they hit puberty, their hips start to widen, their Q angle in
the leg starts to change, and their risk of an ACL tear
increases with every year of development.
And if they don't have strong hips, that risk is going to

(16:31):
continue to increase. But if we're strengthening the
hips, they're able to do that movement without, you know,
they're able to jump. They're able to land with a much
reduced risk of ACL tear injury.And so there's so many benefits
other than just stronger, more aesthetic muscles in children,
in stronger bones. There's improved coordination.

(16:52):
They have better posture. They have better injury
resistance, as I've mentioned, and confidence.
You know, if you are stronger than the kids around you, you're
going to have more confidence inso many different things.
And that's going to carry over beyond just sports, beyond even,
you know, school performance andthings like that.
You're going to be more confident socially.

(17:12):
You're going to be more confident in your ability to
perform and interact with other people.
There's just so many benefits that come with resistance
training. But again, the the main focus
has to be on technique variety, but again, not an excessive
amount of variety. I think that concept of muscle
confusion and never doing the same thing is really, really the

(17:35):
wrong approach for kids. Yeah.
You want to keep those movement patterns very basic, teach them
how to squat. Maybe it's doing a goblet squat
or even just a body weight squatuntil they have that technique
down perfectly. You know, you don't need to be
doing a bunch of different typesof squats.
You don't have to be doing different types of deadlifts or
bench pressing. Get them to learn the technique

(17:57):
and then once the technique is mastered, begin to add weight,
begin to add some variety. The biggest thing is keep it
fun, you know, and don't do Max lifts.
Don't encourage kids to be lifting for appearance.
One of the biggest issues I havewith training adolescents,
adolescent males, is the first thing that going to do when they
go into the gym is bicep curls and bench press.

(18:19):
Because somewhere along the linethey learned that having a
strong bench press and having big biceps is the key to
performance. And those are like the last
muscles I would work in young kids.
I would primarily focus on, you know, doing a squatting motion,
doing a dead lifting motion, doing poles, because that's
going to affect posture. It's going to affect their

(18:42):
ability to be able to lift heavier benches because they
have a stronger shoulder structure in order to be able to
support those heavier weights. And so don't do 1 repetition
maximums. They don't need to be ever doing
that unless they absolutely needto do that.
You know, if you're going to be a power lifter, then maybe you
have to start working toward Maxlifts or an Olympic lifter.

(19:02):
But nobody needs to be comparingtheir bench press, their squat
with somebody else before they're bone structure has
completely developed because you're going to have injury.
So I just kind of want to add inon that, but I think by teaching
kids proper technique at it at such a young age could really,

(19:23):
really benefit in the long run because then they're going to
get that that muscle motor connection with the actual
movement itself because their bodies.
So they're so new and they're going to become used to that
movement and that movement is going to be a secondary nature.
I don't know if you've ever tried to teach a kid how to

(19:44):
squat and then try to teach a fully grown adult how to squat.
That person is never squatted a day in their life, but the kid,
it just perfect technique almosthappens instantaneously because
there it's something new, it's something exciting versus an
adult. They're like, oh, that stiffness
is coming, but the adult kind ofoverthinks it a little bit.

(20:08):
But if you can start at a young age and just have that movement
just become natural, really think it pays off in the end.
So I completely agree with you on that.
Doctor Armstrong, I also, you mentioned earlier that when a
infant is a newborn, you know, we kind of play around with

(20:29):
their arms and stuff and that starts that process of
resistance training. That opened up a memory that
when I was in college, we, I can't remember what course it
was, but they actually handed out a little piece of paper of
what weeks to start implementing.
Like bringing the leg back closer to the head and having it

(20:52):
stretch out and taking the arms and moving them out and then
poking the palms and having the grip and all of that helps with
that motor development. And, and that can be a form of
resistance training at such a young age.
And I completely forgot about that until you brought that up.
So I think to answer our question, we don't need a, we

(21:16):
don't need to complicate resistance training with
infants. It's, it's, it's little tiny
things. I loved your example with the
groceries. Not only is it teaching kids
resistance, but it's also building that confidence as well
because they're like, all right,mom wants me to help bring in
the groceries. Here you go, mom.

(21:38):
And and then if mom's like, wow,you're so strong, it makes the
kid, it gives that positive feedback to, I want to keep
doing that. And it kind of just, I don't
know, I think that's really cool.
I loved everything that you had to say on that.
So thank you. I really appreciate that.
I kind of want to dive into foodbecause we know that has to do

(21:59):
with bone density. So let's talk food.
And what role does nutrition play in developing strong bones
early on? Well, I mean, anybody is aware
of what Ricketts is, knows how important nutrition is for bone
development. And even, you know, when the
nutrients are are there, our ability to utilize the

(22:21):
nutrients, you know, is important for bone development
because there are people in the United States that still get
rickets. It's more of a genetic
predisposition of that. And it might entail poor
absorption of calcium and vitamin D.
But you know, key nutrients are anything that is going to be a
constituent of bone and muscle tissue.
And so getting adequate calcium,getting vitamin D and vitamin D,

(22:45):
we, we really want to consider the source of vitamin D and how
our bodies utilize those sources.
And supplemental vitamin D is not going to be as effective as
vitamin D that is formed naturally in our tissue in
response to sun exposure. And so getting kids outside with

(23:07):
moderate levels of protection against the ultraviolet rays is
going to be very important to that bone mineral density.
And so we tend to over protect kids.
We also have to be aware that over overindulgence in
sunscreens is going to limit that vitamin D synthesis.
And so we want to take a really good balanced approach to
exposure to the sun to be able to stimulate vitamin D

(23:30):
production. But getting calcium, getting the
minerals like magnesium and phosphorus, we tend to ignore
those. And we know magnesium and
phosphorus can very easily be deficient in kids.
And so getting a diet that is rich in magnesium and
phosphorus, even potassium, those types of things, but also

(23:50):
protein, getting adequate protein in the diet for
development, it doesn't matter whether it's animal based or
plant based, getting the appropriate amount of protein
for developing kid is going to be critical.
And so making sure they're getting good sources, good
quality food, weather plant based or animal based that are

(24:11):
going to give them the amino acids that their muscles need,
their bones need to be able to develop.
So we want to, you know, when we're talking nutrition and
kids, this is a challenge in ourgeneration, but we have to be
really trying to focus more on Whole Foods over supplementation
unless the kid is deficient. So don't just assume that a kid

(24:32):
is deficient in calcium, vitaminD, magnesium, phosphorus.
They don't necessarily have to load them up on milk or those
types of things or foods that are supplemented with these
minerals. If we are getting good Whole
Foods, if you're concerned that they are deficient, get them
checked. Physician can easily check for

(24:53):
you know blood levels of calciumand vitamin D and magnesium and
so on. But but really focus on good
quality, balanced Whole Foods and that's going to set them up
for a lifetime of eating well tobe able to maintain their bone
mineral density. And then remember that gut
health matters. So you know, think about what's

(25:13):
going to promote absorption, what's going to maybe promote
inflammation. So eating again, a healthy whole
food plant based type of approach is going to have an
impact on their overall bone formation.
Eating a lot of ultra processed foods, drinking a lot of soda or
eating foods that have a low mineral content, those are

(25:35):
things that are going to really negatively affect the kids bone
mineral density. Probably one of the worst things
that we do to our children is introduce them to soda or pop.
You know, because kids start drinking pop early on and I made
this mistake. I allowed my kids to start
drinking pop and you know, they,they drink too much of it begin.
That's kind of how I was raised.Pop was so readily available and

(25:59):
it's tastes so good to kids. And so that's what they want to
drink. They don't want to drink water
because pop is so much better. And so avoid the very ultra
processed foods, avoid drinking canned beverages and, you know,
things that are coming out of the inner aisles of the grocery
store. Introduce them to good produce,

(26:21):
whole grains to, you know, rather than processed cereal in
a box. Get them eating oats and barley
and, you know, healthy grains for breakfast as opposed to, you
know, sugared fruit circle, highly colored wrapped food and
doughnuts and all that other kind of junk that we tend to
feed kids. So doctor, I'm sorry, now I know

(26:42):
you're not a nutritionist, but I, I, I feel like you have a
good concept of this subject. And also, after interviewing on
this podcast, people that specialize in nutrition, Can you
just provide the listeners some examples of specific Whole Foods

(27:03):
that you would recommend for either your kids or yourself if
you wanted to increase that bonedensity?
Not just a broad statement of protein, but like like a
specific example. So our listeners can here and
say, OK, I'm just going to add that little bit to my diet.
I don't think that's appropriatefor me to answer because we have

(27:27):
viewers and listeners that are across the globe and so
seasonally, regionally, there are going to be different foods
accessible to us. And so and then we have
different tastes as well. I mean, broccoli is a great
thing that I would recommend because there's so much good
nutrients in broccoli, but not everybody likes broccoli, you
know? So I would just narrow it down

(27:49):
to fresh whole fruits and vegetables high in fiber,
brightly colored, you know, so try and get the color spectrum.
You have yellows and Reds and Blues and purples in your food.
The more color variety that you're getting in your
vegetables, the more likely you are to be getting all of the
nutrients and the phytochemicalsin the foods that are going to

(28:13):
promote absorption and give us the best bang for the buck.
And so you want to get a lot of healthy greens, whether it's
leafy greens or, you know, your,your broccolis, cauliflower,
Brussels sprouts. I mean, what vegetable are you
going to get your kid to eat andencourage them to eat What are

(28:35):
good healthy vegetables? If they like something and it's
healthy, then keep them eating that and slowly be able to
introduce or sway them towards the things that they are less
likely to like. Don't kind of swim your
vegetables in butter and sauces in order to get the kid to like
them or don't fry them in order to get them to like them.

(28:57):
Introduce them in a way that thekid is going to get the
vegetables in ways that they're going to enjoy them and begin to
advance and favor those vegetables in other ways.
I mean, I grew up, I hated Brussels sprouts.
Now I love them partly because Iknow how healthy Brussels
sprouts are. It just took some years of, you

(29:18):
know, being forced to eat them and, you know, maybe not
enjoying them as much and just having to try them a little bit
and then beginning to to experiment in them a little bit
more. Asparagus is probably another
vegetable. It's really hard for kids to
kind of get their head around early.
I think eggplant was another onethat my mom used to make
eggplant Parmesan all the time. And I didn't like it as much

(29:41):
when I was a kid, but now I loveit.
And so don't avoid exposure to these just and don't force kids
to eat the vegetables that they don't like because that builds
up those barriers to them enjoying them later on in life.
But try and just get as much variety as possible.
Try and do it in their whole fashion as opposed to a

(30:02):
processed fashion, those vegetables.
But start with what they're going to eat and don't worry
about whether it is the healthiest of vegetables.
Worry about building a habit of eating vegetables and, you know,
trying to get them eating the right greens.
Don't feed your kid iceberg lettuce salads like our schools
do, you know, try and get them exposed to romaine lettuce or,

(30:27):
you know, some of the greener leafy vegetables.
You might not get them to jump right into kale, but it may be
eventually you start getting a little bit of kale in with that
spinach or with that you know that romaine lettuce, and they
start to acquire a taste for it.And so do it progressively.
Maybe you sneak it in in other ways.

(30:48):
You can sneak some of those vegetables and fruits in
smoothies for your kid and just get them experiencing a wide
range of vegetables. Reward them for trying
vegetables as opposed to penalizing them for not trying
them. And then as you start looking at
fruits, you know, what are seasonal fruits that they're
gonna eat? Try and focus a lot more on

(31:09):
berries. And yeah, most kids love
berries. I don't think there's any
problem with getting kids eatingberries.
So get them eating more fruit. When it comes to grains, you
know, most grains are not an acquired taste.
We just tend to get these kids introduced to sugary cereals and
then they get addicted to the sugar in the cereal and that's

(31:31):
all they want. And another good way to keep
your kid from wanting to eat a lot of box cereals turn off the
TV because I found with my kids,they didn't want sugary cereals
until they saw commercials. And when we, you know, we spent
most of our kids years we had cable, but they did a lot more
on demand TV. And it wasn't until they watched

(31:52):
regular TV and saw commercials that they're like, I want that.
I need that, you know, they never asked for things.
And so disconnecting the cable, avoiding commercials, you're
going to avoid a big fight with your kid over sugary cereals.
Yeah, I mean smart. You know, I actually knew
someone and how she got her kid to eat vegetables.

(32:14):
She would take like spinach or broccoli or whatever and chop it
up really, really fine and throwit in the spaghetti sauce.
And you couldn't even tell. It made no difference in flavor
at all. And you're probably thinking,
oh, that's probably really bad. There was no difference in
flavor. And the kid just, he hated

(32:36):
vegetables, but man, he loved that spaghetti sauce.
And so it was kind of like a good way to cycle, like, you
know, trick him. But he was still getting all the
nutrition he needs. Before we move forward, I just
have one question about vitamin D Yeah, we we both know that it
is ideal to get get vitamin D through natural sunlight.

(32:59):
But what would you recommend foran individual who say, lives in
an area like we do here in the Pacific Northwest, specifically
in the Willamette Valley where there's a lot of rain?
What would you say that someone that lives in a high, high
concentrated area of cloudy, overcast and rain and doesn't

(33:20):
really get to see the sun that often?
What would you recommend for to get that vitamin D source which
is crucial for bone health? Get outside.
I mean, this notion that becauseit's a little grey outside,
we're not getting the sun is just pure BS.
I mean, it's OK, Yeah, you're not getting direct rays of sun.
You're actually probably gettingbetter sunlight because you're

(33:44):
not getting the direct ultraviolet rays from the sun
and you don't have you might have to spend a little bit more
time outside, but get your ass outside and move out if it's if
it's not pitch black outside, the sun is shining.
The sun's rays are making it to the surface of this earth.
They are making it to your skin.Your body is going to make the

(34:06):
adaptations to convert the cholesterol in your skin to
vitamin D. And so it might be a little bit
harder to get as much vitamin D synthesis in, you know, a cloudy
area, you know, whether you're living in the Pacific Northwest
or you're living in the UK or other areas that are notorious

(34:28):
for being cloudy and dark. And, and actually, you know, the
Pacific Northwest isn't as dark and as Gray as.
It once was the. People in the Pacific Northwest
like to think it is. There are places in the Midwest
that get far more Gray throughout the year than they do
here. And even if it's raining, I
mean, I've experienced times here where I've walked like

(34:51):
years ago when my classroom was in the underneath the, the
bleachers of the stadium at Western Oregon University, you
know, no windows in the classroom.
And we'd walk out after class, it's raining.
But you know, you open the door and you see this blue skies and
rain pouring down. It's like we're still getting
sunlight during the rain and it's filtering through those

(35:13):
clouds. So there's getting outside
during daylight hours is going to give you some benefit in
terms of synthesizing in your vitamin D And you know, if
you're concerned that you're getting enough, get tested
before supplementation because we don't need to supplement if
we don't need to supplement. I guess my I agree with you, I
think people should get out but if it gets absorbed through

(35:36):
sunlight, through the skin, I feel like a factor of it not
being absorbed as much when it'sraining is typically when it
rains people like to wear long sleeves and and that's less sun
exposure. You only got your hands and your
face. And so I don't know that might
throw that might throw a factoryinto it, but I don't know that

(35:57):
we can probably talk about that on another podcast.
I mean, again, the, the, the more you're outside, the more
you're getting exposed to, to sunlight and it's not raining
all the time here. I mean, and you're not always
covered in long, thick sleeves. And so just be cognizant of the

(36:17):
fact you need to get outside more and you're going to get
more of that exposure. I mean, we've, we had millennia
of people who did fine without getting, running around and
going to tanning booths or taking supplementation to get
their vitamin D. So I don't think it's as
worrisome as we we tend to think.

(36:39):
And if we're eating foods that are naturally higher in vitamin
D, we're going to be getting vitamin D synthesis as well.
The back-to-back to the importance of bone health.
Let's let's just connect this all back to aging.
Well, why does all of this matter in our 30s, our 40s, and
even as we enter our 60s? Why?

(37:02):
Why does it matter? Well, because we know that bone
mass is going to decline with age and after about the age of
30, we see that decline start toaccelerate.
And the more bone mass that somebody has to start, the more
they have to lose and they're going to lose it more slowly,
especially if they're physicallyactive and remain physically
active. And so the more bone mineral

(37:24):
density that we can maintain over time, the less prone we are
to fractures and stronger bones also mean we're less likely to
fall. And there's some indication that
a lot of times seniors who fall and break a hip, it was actually
the broken hip that caused the fall, not the fall that caused
the broken hip. And so it is critical that we

(37:47):
First off limit osteopenia. So osteopenia is bone mineral
loss that is pre pathologic. You know it's not when it's
osteoporosis means it's pathologic.
That's where you going to have hip fractures and bone breaking
much more red lay. The bone is so fragile.
You start seeing in the older population starting to lose

(38:09):
height and maybe they become more kyphotic because gravity
acting on those weaker bones start to kind of crush the bones
a little bit. And so under the weight of the
body, they didn't tend to collapse a bit.
And so we lose height. That's osteoporosis.
Osteopenia is just that natural loss that we have.
Over time, we're all going to experience a certain amount of

(38:29):
osteopenia, but the more active we are, the more reserves that
we have available to us, the less likely we are to see that
osteopenia reach any level of significance.
And so if we have strong bones, we're more mobile, we're more
independent, we're going to havemore confidence as we age.
If I have strong bones, I'm not afraid to go out and do more

(38:52):
intensive physical activity because I'm not worried about
breaking a hip if I have very fragile bones.
And there are people who have fragile bones pathologically
from a young age. They'd also have to be more
aware of the activities that they're doing.
The more I can move, the more I'm willing to move and the less
likely I am to see loss in bone mineral density as I age and the

(39:15):
healthier I'm going to be. And so, yeah, longevity is
great. You know, we can live for 120
years, but if we can't live actively and we can't live
functionally, then what's the whole purpose?
And I always go back to the movie Wally, like you saw that
movie where I guess Earth becomes so inhabitable that the

(39:38):
people of Earth kind of go up into these spaceships.
And there's like 500 years living on these spaceships that
are kind of orbiting the Earth. And overtime, the population
becomes less and less active. They're kind of moving around on
those scooters like you see at the Walmart, kind of with their
computer screens on there controlling everything.
They've become morbidly obese and inactive, and they learned

(40:04):
that. Earth is now inhabitable again,
so they go back to Earth. They land a the ship on the
surface of the Earth and they all get up and they walk out of
that spaceship onto the surface of Earth.
There is no way that a population that has been that
inactive and is that morbidly obese carrying that much excess

(40:26):
body relative to probably almostno muscle mass because they've
been scooting around on those little scooters for their entire
life. And you know, generations doing
that because 500 years, how manygenerations are going to have in
500 years? There is no way their body, the
bone mineral density is going tobe strong enough to be able to
support the amount of weight that they were carrying.

(40:48):
So as soon as they would stand up, the body would just collapse
under the crushing effect of that weight on the bone.
So that that movie always bothered me when it gets to that
point. I mean, it bothered me that
they're just scooting around rather than actually moving.
But the fact that we're not getting activity is going to
cause us to have even weaker bones that aren't going to be

(41:09):
able to support any kind of active.
So it is hugely important for usnot only to be physically active
in our teen years, but to maintain that level of activity
throughout our 30s, forties, fifties, 60s and beyond, because
that's going to help us to maintain our bone mineral
density and that's what's going to help us prevent osteoporosis.

(41:30):
OK. So you've talked, you've talked
before about movement obviously as a formation, not just
fitness. So how?
How does it show up here? Well, movement, again, we tend
to think movement is, you know, only fitness.
And this is where, you know, a poor history of physical
activity, physical education, all that kind of things can

(41:51):
really impact this over the longhaul.
You know, we're not training to be fit as children, and we're
training for function. We're training to develop and
shape our bodies and our systems, to be resilient, to be
free of disease, to have strong immune systems, to have the bone
mineral density that is going tosustain us for a long life.

(42:12):
We're also training for improvedneuromuscular coordination, to
have confidence, to have better postural integrity.
So this goes back to the whole idea of, you know, movement
exercise. All the things that we do for
aging well comes back to the biomechanical psychosocial, you

(42:34):
know, So all of that movement that we're doing is not only
impacting our continued ability to move and to have movement
that is going to keep us injury free, but it also gives us the
confidence and the intention to be socially active, to be
confident. That confidence is going to

(42:56):
carry over into the our income as we age because the more
confident somebody is, the more fit they are, the more hireable
they are, the more promotable they are.
We know that people fitter, athletic, healthier individuals
are going to make more income over the course of their life
than somebody who is much more frail, out of shape, overweight

(43:19):
and those types of things. And so there are so many
different aspects that play intothis.
It's it's more about stewardshipof the body than it is about
sports performance because very rarely beyond the age of
probably 20 or any of us going to be really participating in
competitive athletics, we might be playing, You know, big thing

(43:41):
now is pickleball in my generation.
And yeah, OK, we're athletes nowbecause we're in our 60s and we
play pickleball and you're not really an athlete, you're just
physically active. But the more physically active,
the more activities that we can do, the better the quality of
life, the better the longevity of life, the better the health
span, and just the more we're going to be able to do and

(44:02):
accomplish in whatever number ofyears we have on this earth.
What would one thing that you want our listeners to take away
from this episode? Well, I think the biggest thing
is what we do for our kids now is literally going to build
their future body. So when we're prohibiting our
kids from getting outside playing and we think we're

(44:25):
keeping them safe, we're probably doing them far more
harm. We know that strong bones are
going to lead to strong, resilient lives.
But we have to start early. You know, we can expect kids to,
once they leave the home, they're going to start going to
the gym, They're going to start exercising and start lifting
weights. We got to start them early.
And I'm not opposed to resistance training in in

(44:47):
younger people, you know, get them started when they're young.
Good way to start them is with machines because it is a little
bit safer and they can learn thebasic movements as a muscle
contracts. But get kids active early, get
them outside playing, get them in involved in sports, even if
it's just doing kind of a basic gymnastics course.
We're not planning on them competing.

(45:09):
You're not anticipating them becoming, you know, the next
Olympic gold medalist. Get them to be able to move in a
way that's going to help their bodies develop more effectively
and it for adults, it's not too late to strengthen what supports
you. So even if you've missed that
optimal window, you weren't active as a child, you can

(45:29):
beginning to get active no matter what your age is, even if
you're well into your 80s, you're going to do your bones
benefit by getting much more active later on in life.
And so if you're a parent, look at your child's week.
Are they loading their bones regularly?
Are they doing that with movement, play, strength
training? If you're adult, ask yourself

(45:51):
the same question. Are you maintaining the bone
mineral density that you have built up in your youth, or are
you neglecting that foundation of aging well?
So I think in summary, in order to maintain proper bone health,
it starts when you're young. Add the resistance with your
infants by moving their hands and their feet and just getting

(46:13):
that resistance at a young age. And as as the child develops and
they get a little older, just introduce them to helping you
out with the groceries, something super simple.
Don't be fearful of them being involved in sports and other
activities. Expose them to as much physical
movement as possible, specifically gymnastics,

(46:33):
calisthenics, eventually moving on to resistance and weight
training, lighter weight, but proper form and technique.
Make sure that you and your child are eating Whole Foods
that are rich in supplements or that are rich in minerals that
are designed perfectly to help strengthen bone density.

(46:56):
And with that can carry on not only in your youth and in your
20s, but in your 30s, your 40s, up to your 60s.
And by doing so and just gettingoutside and absorbing as much
sunlight, this not only will help you with your bone density
and prevent osteoporosis, but it'll also help you age well.

(47:19):
Thank you for listening. Hope you benefited from today's
podcast and until next time, keep aging well.