As we get older, we might chase the fountain of youth.
You might notice your hair starting to lose pigment and requiring frequent dye jobs or your skin feeling dry and rough after a night of drinking.
Various factors cause you to age faster. Some are self-inflicted like a poor diet or smoking. Others may be caused by poor sleep or stress.
But how can these factors make you look older?
Unhealthy Eating
An unhealthy diet causes numerous health problems. But did you know that some of your favorite foods can cause you to age faster?
Yes, that’s right!
Your French fries and soda are doing you no good if you want a youthful look.
Two main reasons accelerate the aging process in your skin: advanced glycation end products and sun exposure.
You can manage both fairly well, but it won’t be 100% in your control. The best you can do to minimize exposure is by using sunscreen and eating healthy.
But what foods age you faster?
French fries are one food that can cause you to age faster. Unfortunately, most food fried in high temperatures excretes free radicals.
Free radicals cause cellular damage and accelerate the aging process through cross-linking.
Cross-linking interacts with your DNA and may weaken your skin’s elasticity. If you add salt to your fries, it can draw water out of your skin and cause dehydration.
This can cause wrinkles.
You can swap to sweet potato fries for copper. The copper helps with collagen production.
Sugary drinks, coffee, and alcohol are unhealthy in various ways. Normally, you might think of weight gain or that it’s bad for your teeth or liver.
Most never think to consider it causes you to age faster. Sugary drinks and coffee give you a boost of energy at first but cause that inevitable crash.
They also interfere with your sleep schedule.
A lack of sleep will give you wrinkles, fine lines, and dark circles.
Alcohol reduces collagen production, depletes your body of nutrients, and causes dehydration.
All of these increase the aging process.
Dairy products have come under fire recently for causing many health problems, including ones related to your skin.
Now, this may not be a cure for everyone.
Some people report no difference in their skin when cutting dairy out, while others report improved complexions. One theory behind this is inflammation.
Dairy may increase inflammation in your body.
This can lead to oxidative stress. Some dermatologists say that low dairy diets may prevent your skin from wrinkles in the sun.
Processed meats like bacon, pepperoni, and sausage are known for being bad for your health but they’re also harmful to your skin.
They are full of sodium, saturated fats, and sulfite. These dehydrate your skin and lower your production of collagen and cause inflammation.
Meats like chicken and turkey are high in protein and amino acids. These help aid in the production of amino acids.
Alcohol
Most people don’t think of the negatives of alcohol and just the good time they have when they drink it.
Unfortunately, it wreaks havoc on the body. It’s not only unhealthy for your organs but does more than you would expect to your body.
Alcohol makes you age faster in various ways. One way that alcohol ages you is through dehydration.
We all know after a night of drinking we need tons and tons of water just to get back to normal.
Alcohol consumption leads to more frequent trips to the bathroom.
The more you drink, the more dehydrated your body will become. It’s most noticeable with your skin, aside from all your hangover symptoms.
Your skin becomes dry and filled with wrinkles. To avoid this, you can either drink less alcohol or drink water while drinking alcohol.
That will not just help with your skin but with hydration and less chance of a hangover too.
Another way alcohol ages you faster is by depleting your body of nutrients.
Nutrients are important to your body’s daily functioning. Some nutrients that get depleted are ones that help carry oxygen in your body.
The vitamin that depletes the most from alcohol consumption is vitamin A. Vitamin A is an antioxidant and essential for your skin and cell building.
Vitamin A aids in the production of collagen. Collagen helps prevent wrinkles, keeps your skin elastic, and full.
Reduction of collagen leaves your skin looking aged and taunt.
Frequent alcohol consumption can cause weight gain. Alcohol raises your insulin levels and increases fat storage.
The fat storage mainly takes place in the liver which can lead to fat around your stomach giving you a “beer” belly.
Weight gain, especially around the jowls, can give off an aged look to your appearance.
Alcohol causes puffiness, swelling, and redness in your face. Alcohol widens the blood vessels to bring blood to your face.
As you continue to drink, your blood vessels will become too large and it can lead to blotchiness and redness permanently.
You get the blotchiness from the broken capillaries under the skin. This commonly happens around your eyes and nose.
Alcohol disrupts sleep. Your sleep cycle becomes all over the place to where you might fall asleep early but wake up in the middle of sleep.
Some have a hard time sleeping. A lack of sleep causes dark circles and for some, puffy eyes.
The deep stages of sleep are essential to maintain your appearance and your cognitive function.
While you should avoid alcohol altogether, some will still indulge. If you do indulge, keep it within moderation.
Stress
We all know that stress isn’t good for your mind or your body. It can cause serious health issues if you experience chronic stress frequently.
Your risk of depression and cardiovascular disease increases. Your immune system faces negative effects too.
But did you know that stress wears itself on your face?
How?
Chronic stress manifests in two ways. One way is through your hormones.
When you are stressed, your body releases hormones that can physiologically impact your skin.
You may start developing acne.
When you’re stressed, your body produces more cortisol. You might have heard cortisol mentioned regarding weight gain.
This hormone causes your hypothalamus to produce corticotrophin-releasing hormone.
Your glands will release more oil causing clogged pores and acne due to this hormone.
Stress can result in a change in your sleep cycle leading to deprivation.
Deprivation causes physical changes to your appearance like dark circles, eye bags, fine lines, and less elasticity in the skin.
You can also develop rashes, dry skin, and wrinkles. Your hair might even turn gray or you may experience hair loss due to stress too.
The other way it negatively affects you has to deal with stress coping habits that are conscious or subconscious like teeth grinding or biting your lips.
This can lead to teeth damage, sore lips or cheeks, or TMD. TMD is a jaw issue that is caused by clenching your teeth.
Sleep Deprivation
Sleep is one of the most important, natural ways to heal our bodies and mind. Many processes happen while you are sleeping.
Your body’s cells repair and build new ones, your brain removes waste, and your brain gets a chance to rest.
Studies on sleep have been conducted for many years. They found that a lack of sleep will negatively affect your memory and cognitive functions.
However, it could also cause your skin to age faster.
A sleep study conducted found that poor sleep led to increased aging in skin. Participants who experienced poor sleep even self-rated their skin worse than those who slept well.
Sleep-deprived skin showed a decrease in the ability to recover from sun exposure.
The study also found that those who didn’t sleep well suffered from fine lines, uneven pigmentation, reduction of skin elasticity, and a harder time to recover from sun exposure and stressors.
Those that slept were able to recover and heal faster.
The study also discovered more bad news for poor sleepers. Researchers found that those who suffered from poor sleep were more likely to be overweight.
Compared to quality sleepers, 44% of poor sleepers were obese and only 23% of quality sleepers were overweight.
Another study conducted by UCLA researchers found that just one night of poor-quality sleep can age an adult’s cells quicker.
These cells don’t have the chance to heal and repair. Another study conducted on those 55 and older found that structural changes occur in the brain in those who get poor sleep.
These structures commonly occur with aging and hold information like memory functions and storage.
It’s recommended to get no less than seven hours of uninterrupted sleep per night.
Smoking
Smoking is awful for your health. It’s no secret that smoking comes with a laundry list of health issues. One of the most talked-about next to cancer is what it does to your skin.
Smoking can make you age faster in various ways.
It speeds up your skin’s aging process. You can get crow’s feet, lines between your eyebrows, eye creases, wrinkles around your mouth, grayish tone to your skin, or thinner lips.
Nicotine, along with the other chemicals, can cause more skin issues that will make you look older than you are.
Nicotine narrows the blood vessels causing less oxygen and nutrients to reach the skin.
Second-hand smoke may cause dry skin and even damage the surface of it.
Many of the chemicals in cigarettes cause damage to the structures of skin and make it more difficult for elasticity and health to occur.
Lack of Exercise
There have been countless studies on the benefits to exercise and the negatives if you don’t.
However, most people don’t talk about how a lack of exercise can cause you to age faster.
The focus is usually more on weight loss or health problems that occur if you don’t like heart disease or weaker bones.
A study was done on men in their early 20s and bed rest found that a lack of exercise aged their body.
They had higher heart rates when at rest, higher blood pressure, a rise in body fat, less muscle strength, and a reduction in their heart’s pumping capacity.
These characteristics are often seen in men in their 40s or 50s, but these men were in their 20s!
After they completed the three weeks of bed rest, scientists put the men on an eight-week exercise program.
Exercise reversed these negative effects and even led to better tests than before they started the whole research project.
A 30 year follow up was conducted on the participants. It found that some men gained about 50 pounds and doubled their body fat, but they didn’t require any long-term medicines.
Naturally, they had a decrease in their heart’s pumping capacity, a rise in heart rate at rest, a rise in blood pressure, and decreased cardiac function.
However, their levels were nowhere near as bad as they were when they participated in the bed rest study.
The men were then asked to complete a six-month exercise program.
At the end of the six-months, their levels significantly improved which led researchers to discover the power of age-reversal exercise.
Now, while exercise has shown to aid in a more youthful appearance and overall health. You can overdo your workouts and cause your body to age faster.
This happens when you overtrain and cause injury or when you focus too much on one exercise (i.e., cardio only routines).
Like with anything, perform in moderation.
Final Thoughts
Many factors can cause you to age faster.
However, some of these may be out of your control.
For the factors you can control like your diet, exercise, and smoking, it might be time to make healthier lifestyle changes.
Not only do these factors affect the aging process, but they are also harmful to your overall health.
