“Do you drink coffee? Do you eat citrus fruits? Balsamic vinegar?” The inquisition starts at the dental hygienist’s as usual. I am guilty of these sins and the price I will pay is having my gums poked till they bleed. And the lecture.
I always ask not to have the lecture, but I get it anyway. To be fair, I didn’t even know balsamic vinegar was on the list of banned things that will cause my mouth to collapse, so this is new information. I promise to use “interdental brushes” more, though I cannot imagine “I wish I had spent more time flossing” ever being a deathbed regret somehow.
Sure, I know plaque is somehow connected to dementia, it’s just that I keep forgetting. Or can’t be bothered to remember.
Endless health advice, now often in the guise of anti-ageing tips, is making me miserable, and being miserable is in itself ageing. How many ways can there be to say what we all surely know by now? “Eat less, move more, try not to drink yourself to death, get stuff checked.”
My phone even beeps information at me that I never asked it to. My socials are full of C-list celebs flogging collagen, magnesium, some sort of mushrooms, talk of “peptides” and lots of information about activating one’s glutes.
Sure, run about! Eat vegetables! But seriously, one gets to an age where one realises things aren’t fair. They never have been. People get illnesses and die too young. Others don’t and yes it would be nice to think that if we are lucky enough to get old our brains and bodies hold out, but there are no guarantees.
There is a kind of madness afoot in thinking one must try to live forever by forfeiting everyday pleasures. At the extreme end is the super-weird Bryan Johnson, he of the translucent skin, a biohacking vegan who wants to live till he is at least 150. He tracks his nighttime erections, which he then compares with his 21-year-old son’s. He has also had a litre of his son’s blood transfused into him. I know, he sounds like such a fun guy! Great Dad!
None of this has stopped him being diagnosed with an autoimmune disease: gastritis, which is horrible.
But them’s the breaks. No amount of monitoring and exercise and supplements and restrictive diets can stop certain illnesses. It is delusional to think otherwise. Johnson, 49, insists his biological age is 18.
Rightio! In his battle to avoid mortality he seems to be avoiding the really fundamental question of: what is life for? All the self-obsessed “healthmaxxers” do. What matters ultimately are our relationships to other people, some of whom may become frailer than we do through no fault of their own.
That and enjoying the life we have while we have it.
Just don’t tell my dentist.