ABC Overnights broadcast an interview last weekend where health and fitness expert Dr Gordon Lynch weighed up whether the pros and cons of retiring early for your longevity.
You can listen to it here. His main points?
You need to stay active throughout your life – and your retirement – if you want to live longer.
And whether you hang up the boots earlier or later, poorer health outcomes are always recorded among retirees who are unmarried and have less social interaction.
Where can you find all of this? In a retirement village or land lease community.
Staying active in retirement
While the entry age for villages is 55 years, you can keep working long after you move in.
Villages also provide opportunities to work in other ways, such as volunteering on social committees or at a Men’s Shed.
They also offer the chance to maintain – or start – a health and fitness routine with facilities that can include gyms, pools, lawn bowls and walking groups – all at your doorstep.
That’s not counting the sense of community that is the main reason many people enjoy living in a village.
As Dr Lynch says: it’s the old saying – don’t retire from something, retire to something.
Find out more about retirement villages here.
Discussion1 Comment
Retirement reduces the physical activity in the most of cases. As a result, the people get less and less active over time, and this will make their immune systems weaker. Reduced social interactions are another major reason for health problems during the retirement.