With age often comes reduced physical activity and weight gain. Unfortunately, it doesn't stop there. The aging body, less active and fatter, diminishes its muscular capacity. Strength, balance, and stamina gradually disappear.

Fat doesn't just accumulate in fat cells; it infiltrates muscle fibers, contributing to a more marked reduction in muscular capacity. Combine this loss of muscular capacity with an overweight or obese body, and you can predict an inevitable loss in a person's quality of life and mobility.

But you don't have to be obese to lose muscle capacity as you age. A diet rich in lipids (fats) produces the same effect. Lipids invade muscle fibers, again reducing their capacity. Not to mention that this is a significant cause of insulin resistance that leads to type 2 diabetes.

We must consider long-term planning if we want to maintain our autonomy in our later years. This involves regular exercise to maintain our muscular capacity and a balanced diet that keeps us healthy.

But why worry about all that when we can end our lives in a nursing home, sitting in a wheelchair, staring at a blank wall day after day, until there's nothing left of us?