How I Dropped to 19% Body Fat at 65

In this article, I will give you my secrets to staying fit, both in body and mind, and offer tips on achieving your fitness goals at any age.

I sound like a wise old person. I’m neither wise nor old. But the older I get, the less stupid I become.

I recently finished my 65th trip around the sun. Sixty-five used to be old. Now, it’s the new whatever your mind wants it to be.

This leads me to … Secret #1.

Don’t think like an old person. EVER! I don’t care if you’re in your teens or 100s (The 100s group is growing in size); think young. Hang out with young people. Stay current. Embrace new technologies. Do stuff you’re not “supposed to do.” Break rules!

Never say … “When I was your age …” because the minute you do, you become a holier-than-thou annoying old person, and whoever you’re talking to will stop listening.

Turn the tables around and learn from people younger than you.

OK, now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, let’s get to why you clicked on this article — keeping your body — your temple, God’s temple, if that’s what you choose to call it — fit and healthy.

Did you get that? Healthy. Not just fit. Because many people look fit, but they’re one pushup or smoothie away from an injury or a health crisis.

Let’s start by breaking some food rules.

Give Yourself Permission To Eat Shit

Food is fuel. It’s also fun.

The first thing you should eliminate from your diet is the word diet.

Diet implies eating for a designated amount of time to reach a goal (most likely losing weight), returning to your old ways, putting back all the weight you lost — and more — when your diet ends, and beginning the cycle anew.

You go on a diet and then back to being fat.

Diet, lose, eat, gain, rinse, repeat.

And as Tony Robbins once said, “The first three letters of the word diet are DIE.”

You get the point.

Diets end. Healthy eating doesn’t. Aim for healthy eating. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to know how to do that. Have you ever heard of an app? With some help from your friend Google, you will find dozens of apps that will teach you how to eat right without overwhelming you with scientific information and formulas that will send you sailing to the Chips Ahoy! and Oreos aisle.

But for God’s sake, make sure the “guru” you’re listening to is credible. (More about this later.)

Back to our story.

I have eaten healthy all my life, although I didn’t realize it until the things I’ve eaten since I was a kid — like fruit as a snack and a salad with every meal — became trendy.

But lest you think of me as an elementary school hummus-eating nerd (I was), I also had my share of Twinkies and Ho Hos. Waiting for the Good Humor ice cream truck to pull up to my Brooklyn street every afternoon after school was a religion.

So, full disclosure. I’ve eaten my share of shit.

You can too, but balance it with eating clean about 90% of the time (I made up that percentage, so find what works for you and stick to it).

Everything in moderation. It’s a motto you should live by starting right now.

Work Out, REST, RECOVER!

My journey to low body fat didn’t begin overnight, and it wasn’t limited to the kitchen. Although once I hit my 50s, the kitchen started playing a more significant role in my fitness level.

I have always been active.

My days as a Brooklyn tomboy included hours of sewer-to-sewer stickball until it was so dark the only thing visible was the glow of the pinky ball flying too close to Mrs. Tracey’s bay window, from which she glared at those crazy kids outside.

A week before starting the third grade, I fell off my bicycle, broke my arm, and spent a month in a cast. The cast was a badge of honor. All the kids thought it was cool.

Biking is my cardio of choice. And I still fall. These days, my badge includes two trips to the emergency room, 13 stitches, a dislocated shoulder, and enough bruises to make purple jealous.

I also fell off my bike and broke my wrist, but by the time I went to see a doctor, it had healed on its own perfectly.

“You are a freak of nature,” he said. “You can resume all exercise; just don’t do pushups.” I went home and immediately did pushups. I should have listened to the doctor.

But Ruby, my bike, is OK. And that’s all that matters. (More on Ruby later.)

In my 20s, I ran marathons. Three of them. All in NYC. I also ran dozens of shorter road races, ignoring my knees and their complaints. Taking a day off sent me into guilt trips that made me want to go to confession.

I moved to Florida and discovered that running in the Florida heat made waterboarding look like fun. (Not that I’ve ever been waterboarded, but it’s the only analogy that I could think of while writing this.)

That’s when I found the joys of weight training. I loved it from the get-go.

Although I pushed myself through three trainers, I could never get below 25 percent body fat. I was fit and strong, but I was skinny fat. At the time, I was not paying attention to what I ate, mostly because I was still eating like a marathoner, and my workouts were keeping me thin despite my higher-than-I-wanted body fat percentage.

My knees were also trying desperately to get my attention. I dislocated my right one running on the treadmill. However, I didn’t know it was dislocated. Three months and a three-week excruciatingly painful European vacation later, I finally decided to have it checked out. I still feel the pain just thinking about the X-ray.

Don’t be like me. If your injury hurts for more than a few days, get it checked out.

You’re in this for the long haul. Push through the pain, and you risk your future fitness.

Which is fine if your goal is to be the envy of a manatee.

Ruby To The Rescue

Then came a little blip on the exercise radar known as the pandemic, COVID-19, or fake news — whatever you prefer.

I was determined to come out of it fit and fast. I biked hundreds of miles but not much else. I was fit, and I was fast. But not much else.

Riding my bike, followed by hours of sitting on my ass during work Zoom meetings, lifting my water bottle became my weight-bearing exercise of choice.

My cardiovascular system rivaled that of a cheetah. My body was lean thanks to my inherited skinny genes (not a typo), but lifting anything heavier than 10 pounds was humbling.

In January 2023, my partner’s knee replacement surgery coaxed me back into the gym.

It was there that I found a trainer who helped me get down below the 20 percent body fat level, long after I had accepted I would never get there.

Right out of the gate, while training with him, I realized how much strength I had lost. Bike riding for two years had created muscle imbalances and tightness that scared me as much as it motivated me.

We started slow, something I wasn’t very good at. I also lifted lighter and did fewer reps and sets. But as I began to see quick results, I started paying attention.

When my sessions with him ended, I had gone down to 20 percent body fat. I went back to the gym on my own. And I followed his advice, slowly increasing the weight but always listening to my body for clues I might be overdoing things.

Last weigh-in this morning, my body fat had dipped to 19 percent.

Too Much Of A Good Thing Is Bad

I spend less time on the bike now because too much cardio kills muscle mass.

I’ve stopped punishing myself in the gym, on the road, and in my head … especially in my head.

I no longer feel guilty when I take a day or two off. I know that when I return, I will be rested and able to lift longer and heavier.

Workouts tear your muscles down. Rest days heal. That means you build muscle on your days off. Imagine that.

I see people in the gym lifting weights beyond their means, having horrible form, and injuries waiting to happen. (And what’s up with you, iPhone posers?)

If that’s you, stop it right now. Don’t be impressed by those muscle-bound big boys and girls. Think of where they will be in 10, 20, 30 years. Will they still be in the gym? Or will injuries have won the battle?

A dear coworker recently started working out to recover after a life-changing surgery. I applaud her and the progress she’s made. But now she’s spending two hours in the gym every day. I tell her to slow down. She tells me she loves me, but I know she won’t listen.

Listen up! Less is more. If you sleep in the more, more, more bed, you’ll wake up tired, tired, tired.

And speaking of beds, make yours every morning. My mom does. And she just turned 96.

When I’m 65 (not a song by the Beatles)

Everyone is a health expert these days. Instagram, YouTube, and social media have turned everyday people into influencers and experts on everything, including diet and exercise.

Most are quacks. They are the modern-day version of snake oil salesmen, promoting the latest fad diet. If there’s anything more dangerous than the word diet, it’s the adjective “fad.”

Your brain knows best. Your body likes it when you listen to your brain. If something sounds weird to you, avoid it. If it makes sense, try it. If your body rejects it, move on. It might be good for someone else, but not for you.

For example, if the “experts” tell you yogurt is good for you but yogurt makes you vomit, stop eating yogurt. See, nutrition isn’t that difficult. Eat stuff that doesn’t make you throw up.

Anything taken to extremes is unhealthy.

Again, listen to your body. Learn to find the sweet spot between “I need rest” and “I’m just being a lazy ass.” Sometimes that means starting a workout, but if 10 minutes into it you don’t feel like continuing, stop. It’s OK. Push through, and you could get hurt.

Those are my secrets to staying fit for life.

Now, I know you won’t follow the advice I gave you in this article. How do I know? Because no matter how old I am, I hear advice from other people all the time, but it’s not until I learn by experience that I incorporate that advice into my life. (See what I did there? You thought I was going to say, “Because when I was your age …,” didn’t you?)

So, take from this article what you like, and one day, when you learn the lessons by experience, pay them forward.

Oh, and one more thing … I don’t drink alcohol anymore. If you want to learn more about how sobriety can help you stay physically, mentally, and emotionally fit, the stories of my journey through sobriety will offer insights to help you get started.

Update:

Thank you for reading this article.

I appreciate you and welcome your comments. If you found this article helpful, please share it and give it a few claps so others can find it. If you’d like to support my work, buy me a coffee!

Barb Besteni is a writer, spiritual seeker, former rock star, and animal lover. After 35 years of writing, copyediting, and producing content for local, national, and international television news, she left the newsroom for the comfort of her home office. Get an email whenever Barb publishes a new story on Medium: https://medium.com/@barbbesteni/subscribe.