Author: John Higgins

We, here in Retirement Life place great emphasis on emotional health. While many expect that we should be talking about physical health, getting and staying active, which we do, we are aware that we can so often forget the importance and value of emotional health, particularly as we approach the new milestone of “life in retirement”.

As we focus on the importance of good mental health in our retirement years, we are also aware that not so long ago in our work-life, the very mention of mental health had eyebrows flashing and suspicions aroused as to how “mentally sound” this person might be!. Thankfully, in a more enlightened decade, more and more well-known and less-well-known people are coming out expressing …

[This is a guest post by Consultant Dietitian Gillian McConnell]

Rethinking your dietary habits is just what can give you a wealth of physical and mental benefits that could give you a new lease of life. Think of your body as a machine: fuel/ power is important for a machine to run efficiently. Good/ clean fuel; a car runs well. Bad/dirty fuel over an extended period, the engine will breakdown.

Your health is your responsibility and no one else’s – take care of it and control it.

Ask your doctor to give you a thorough check-up and follow up with regular check-ups. Put into practice the advice you are given – do it now and remember growing old is …

The Healthy Ireland policy document entitled Framework for Improved Health and Wellbeing 2013 -2015 is the government’s plan to improve the health and wellbeing of the nation. So how are we faring mid-way through the lifetime of the plan?

The mid-term report entitled Health in Ireland: Key Trends (2017) revealed that 70% of men and 57% of women are overweight or obese. This also reflects the lack of a personal physical exercise regime whereby only 46% of men and 62% of women are termed “physically active”. All of this reflects significantly on our birth to death life expectancy ratio.

Between 2007 and 2017 the following increases in Life Expectancy are recorded:…

As we prepare for retirement, we need to reflect on our current lifestyle behaviours.

A change to how we live our life can reduce our chances of developing:

Diabetes Cancer Heart Disease Lung Disease Other forms of ill-health.

Tips on Lifestyle Behaviours

Sit less and move more: Be conscious of the length of time you spend sitting. Get up and stand and stretch. Design a physical activity pattern that suits your condition and work on taking 30 minutes exercise at least 5 times a week. Take a look at this website: getirelandactive.ie Don’t smoke and if you do then try and quit smoking which is the best thing you can do to improve your health. To find out more about…

During our retirement courses we consider all aspects of our health including Physical Health (keeping active and eating healthily); our Mental Health (including emotional issues/stress management and resilience) and thirdly the importance of developing our Spiritual Health. In today’s world with all that has happened as regards religious practices many people neglect what is essential to maintaining our Spiritual Health.

So what is Spiritual Health if it is not all about religious practice? Here we intertwine spiritual health with the singular “Spirituality”. Basically, spirituality connects us to a purpose in life that is larger than ourselves. For some this may still be traditional religious practice. Regardless of the methods we us to achieve it, spirituality dictates how we see the …