How necessary is diet/exercise for good health?

[guy666]

I am very lazy and cheap, I'm wondering if my habits are maybe taking a toll on my health. I am overall satisfied with the way I feel/look.

I currently weigh in at 145 at 5'10" and am 25 years old. I have actually lost weight from my high school and college days, while never doing any serious cardio or watching I eat. I mostly just eat post shredded wheat cereal in the morning and either eat fast food or make some of those easy to cook dinners/lunches that are available in supermarkets. I don't really consume anything sugary, but I do like some fried/fatty things.

The only real exercise I do is weight lift once every 1 to 2 weeks. I think I am fairly strong for my size, I can lift around 900 pounds between squat, deadlift, and bench. I can also do 55 fingertip pushups, walk on my hands, do a handstand on my fingertips, etc. But my cardio is admittedly kinda lacking. It takes me 15 mins to run 2 miles and I don't feel good afterwards.

Never been to a doctor for a health checkup (like I said I am cheap). Is cardio exercise and/or a diet really that necessary for a guy like me?

 

[Whisper]

900 lbs between those three lifts for your weight isn't bad at all, considering you only lift once or twice per week. In fact, it's actually surprisingly high--are you sure you're using proper form on the lifts (e.g., touch but not bouncing off of your chest for bench press, hitting parallel for squats)? It's definitely something you'll want to pay attention to, given that improper form can dramatically increase your chance of injury.

Beyond that, I'd say that increasing your weight lifting/cardio routine so that it averages out to 30-45 minutes of physical activity per day could have significant long-term health benefits. You may feel fine now, but your lifestyle may catch up to you over the years, especially as your metabolism slows with age. Fast food and pre-prepared meals (along with fried foods in general) aren't doing your body any favors. They'd be fine in moderation, but given that they seem to be all you're eating, you'll likely want to incorporate things like fresh fruits and vegetables, whole grains, and quality meats.

The above, of course, would represent a significant change from your current lifestyle. Personally, I'd say start with the diet shift, see how it makes you feel, and go from there.

 

[SociallyChallenged]

Exercise (both resistance and cardio) is advisable for everyone no matter what. Let's say you are strong for your weight. That's great. However, that doesn't really benefit your cardiovascular system. Without endurance work (or at least some form of cardio - HIT, HIIT, LSS, etc), your body will automatically age more quickly. Gene expression for aging is turned on much earlier and much more quickly than for those who participate in regular resistance and aerobic exercise. One example - even if you are strong and you're not a vegetarian, you're building up plaque in your arteries in all likelihood. Atherosclerosis is one of the main causes of cardiovascular disease, which is one of the main causes of death in the US. Seriously, quit being so damn lazy and take some time to improve your life.

 

[tcsenter]

Never been to a doctor for a health checkup (like I said I am cheap). Is cardio exercise and/or a diet really that necessary for a guy like me?

The biggest thing you have going for you is that you are very lean, and while that gets you a hugely reduced risk for things like Type II diabetes and hypertension (and some limited categories of cancer), as well as accelerated wear-and-tear type joint problems from being overweight, those aren't the only things that are killing people or substantially diminishing their quality of life.

On second thought, the real biggest thing you have going for you is that you are still YOUNG. Your hormones, physiology, and metabolism WILL change. For some, it happens around the age of 24. For others, its around 26. Some lucky ones won't see it until around 28. But nearly EVERYONE will see it before they are 30.

The question is not, how healthy am I now at the relatively young age of 25 (while I'm still in my peak physiologically, hormonally, metabolically)? The question is, given my current habits, practices, and activities, how healthy will I be 10 or 15 years from now?? Its easy to be healthy when you're mid-20s (unless you already have some health problems, that is), because your physiology, hormones, and metabolism are very different than they will be in just another 5 ~ 8 years (which will come and go more quickly than you think).

When you approach 35 ~ 40, you start to lose lean muscle mass unless you do something about it. And given your stated body type, it doesn't sound like you have much spare muscle mass to lose. You may look lean or ripped in a good way now, but wait another 10 years, when the testosterone levels have started to plummet and your metabolism is different. Your muscles start to go soft, you put on some adipose fat, and you actually lose lean muscle mass and flexibility.

So in some ways, you have to use a little imagination here and trust those who have already gone where you will be going in the next 5 ~ 10 years. If you look around, its easy to find examples of men who were very lean and looking good at 23 ~ 25, but then were 50+ pounds overweight by the time they were 37. Why do you think that happens, because they started eating a lot more or differently? No! Its very often because they didn't have a healthy lifestyle all along, and it wasn't a big deal while they were young, but then they continued to have the same practices and lifestyle after their metabolism and hormones changed.

Because you are young, you don't have to radically change in the next month. Start slow and make small changes every couple weeks, set goals, so that over the course of the next year, the many small changes will cumulatively add-up to a much healthier lifestyle and the change won't be so difficult/dramatic from one month to the next.