Something I’ve noticed a lot when looking through the Facebook profiles of many former service members I know is that a lot of them are overweight. These are all people who were in excellent shape in their earlier years, but today find themselves having gained a sizable amount of weight.

Just because you’re getting old doesn’t mean you have to get fat.

I was fat. Really fat. Hell, by medical standards, I was morbidly obese. That means my health was in extremely poor shape, and I was at high risk for dying from weight-related diseases or maladies. I had Diabetes, fatty liver, and my cholesterol levels were rising. I had circulation problems in my feet, and I was beginning to experience nerve damage from the Diabetes. This was completely preventable and due to me lacking the discipline to control my weight.

I turned it all around within a year. Heck, a blood test just three months after I started confirmed that my body was on its way to being healed: Diabetes and cholesterol were in normal levels and liver enzymes had returned to normal. All within three months.

So many people joke about how getting older means getting fatter. This does not have to be the case! Getting older means the opposite; we need to be MORE careful to take care of our bodies, our health, and maintain our fitness. So many people wish they could stay young, but what they don’t realize is that they can still feel young. That’s because what they miss isn’t being young, but how they felt when they were young, and that feeling was being fit and healthy.

I mistook feeling tired and being out of shape for being old when in fact, I was just unhealthy and unfit. Once I got back to a healthy weight and got fit, I surprised myself by feeling young again. Only then did I realize that the feeling I remember from my youth wasn’t anything else other than being healthy and fit. Now that I feel that way, I truly feel young again!

Don’t accept being fat. Don’t accept being unfit. Don’t accept your lack of energy and mobility as the new normal as you get older. Attack it and do something about it. The best part is all you have to do is eat right and it will come naturally.

Source: Me. I was healthy and fit, turned fat and unfit, and got back to being healthy and fit at 49. I did it and I know that you can do it, too.