Being healthy looks good at any age, and it’s better to start early.

Wellness matters at every age. But arguably, it matters more for children and young adults. That’s because when young people build healthy habits early, they set a strong foundation for the rest of their lives.

In our current society, instilling good habits as early as possible is even more critical. Healthcare costs are out of control, with reports showing that at least half of U.S. adults have skipped or delayed their healthcare needs because they couldn’t afford it. Nearly three in ten also claim they don’t take their medicine as prescribed in order to make it last longer.

While building healthy habits is by no means a cure-all, it can help prevent many healthcare issues throughout our lifetimes. Prioritizing wellness could mean getting sick less often, reducing our chances of serious disease or illness, and being able to keep living an active lifestyle as we get older.

Here’s why monitoring wellness while young is one of the best gifts we can give ourselves.

The Body Is Constantly Changing

Teens are well aware of how their bodies change as they move from childhood to adulthood. But sex ed class only tells part of the story.

First of all, our bodies keeps changing once we reach adulthood. We might not grow any taller, but our bodies continue to evolve in terms of fat, muscle, and bone ratios. This is what we call body composition, and it’s often left out of teen health conversations.

As we get older, our bones start shrinking and losing density. This makes them weaker and more prone to breaking.

Our muscles also lose strength. We become less flexible, and our endurance declines. At the same time, our fat mass tends to increase. It’s easier to hold onto fat because it’s not as “connected” to our metabolism as our muscle. Or, to put it another way, it’s harder to hold onto muscle than it is to maintain fat. Also, our hormones keep changing with age, which can also make it easier to gain fat and lose muscle.

Another age-related change is our resting metabolic rate (RMR), especially when moving from adolescence into adulthood. RMR measures how much energy our bodies needs to function while at rest or doing very light activities, like eating. Studies show that RMR is higher in adolescent males compared to adolescent females, but it progressively decreases with age. Tracking this metric is especially important for younger athletes to ensure they are getting the right amount of calories for their bodies while training.

The same goes for VO2 max, which measures how much oxygen we take in when we exercise at maximum effort. It demonstrates how effectively our heart and veins carry blood to the rest of thebody. Or, in layman's terms, a higher VO2 max indicates a higher level of fitness. This is something we can track and measure over time to see how our training is paying off. And similar to RMR, VO2 max will decline as we age (usually peaking in our 20s or 30s). When it starts falling, we won’t be able to do as much work as we used to because we’ll be producing less energy.

These changes can seem to come out of left field for young adults. We might know we’ll get wrinkles and lose a little muscle definition, but all the other stuff going on deep below the skin can be a mystery—at least until we come face to face with a health concern.

Childhood Obesity Is at an All-Time High

It might sound like common knowledge that healthy habits are built early. But given the current state of childhood obesity, it’s clear that many families simply aren’t doing enough to instill wellness at an early age.

Childhood obesity is at an all-time high. According to CDC data, it affects nearly 20% of children and adolescents between the ages of 2-19 (that’s one in five children!). Another stat caught our eye: obesity tends to affect more children as they get older. When broken down by age group, it affects 13.4% of children ages 2-5; 20.3% of children ages 6-13; and 21.2% of children ages 14-19.

If we continue this same trend, then the risk of obesity only becomes greater with age. Additional CDC data supports this: 40% of adults ages 20-39 are considered obese, while that number jumps to 44.8% among adults ages 40-59.

Just like early intervention matters for reading and math, it also matters for health concerns like obesity. This is true at any age! Finding potential problems early puts them on our radar so we can work on them before they get worse.

Screen Time Threatens Physical Activity

More young people are increasingly drawn to screens and devices. Apps and digital programs made for young minds claim to exercise the mind. They’re educational, so they must be good, right? The reality, of course, is that no amount of mental exercise can improve physical health.

Too much screen time means we have less time to be active. On the flip side, less screen time means kids and young adults have more time to exercise, play outside, socialize, and take care of themselves physically.

And even if we’re using our screen time for exercise and activity, screen time itself still isn’t great for health. The blue light from today’s bright LED screens can mess up sleep patterns, which can set off a domino effect of problems that tie back into physical health: obesity, lower immunity, high blood pressure, and much more.

Plus, studies have shown that too much screen time can impact brain development. Kids with more than two hours per day on screens score lower on thinking and language tests, for example. And even kids and teens who do balance their screen time with physical activity may not be as healthy as their parents like to think.

That’s not to say that kids need to hit the gym to stay physically fit. In fact, strength training isn’t a good idea until kids are at least 7 or 8, according to Mayo Clinic. Children’s skeletal systems continue to grow throughout their teenage years, and lifting weights or starting resistance training too early could leave them prone to injury. Even at age 8, kids need to be able to focus, practice proper form, and only lift light weights. Sports remain a safer alternative to strength training and can demonstrate that fitness can be fun.

How Tracking Body Composition Can Help

You might be thinking, I’ve got my whole life ahead of me. I’m super active because I play sports, so I’m probably pretty healthy. Or, I have plenty of time before I have to start getting my health in tip-top shape. But there is no single “right” age to start thinking about our health and wellness. And even if we’re active right now, it’s even more important to consider how our body composition plays a role in our physical fitness.

For instance, different sports affect the body in different ways. This is important for any current or future athlete to know, especially if planning to play in college or even professional leagues. Take Michael Jordan. He made a major switch from basketball to baseball and needed to retrain his entire body because those two sports use very different muscle groups and movements.

Another example: the recent NFL combine, which invited more than 300 athletes from around the country in preparation for the NFL draft. They tend to spend countless hours training and conditioning for this week, both in the gym and on the field. One goal is to become more physically fit, building strength, endurance, and stamina so they can perform their best during this showcase.

In both of these examples, a person’s body composition can be very telling about how much the body has changed on the inside. Some of the training camps which prepare athletes for the NFL combine are even using body composition assessments to determine whether the players have made the desired physical improvements during the session.

Appearance can give us some clues about our health, but there is so much happening in our bodies that is not visible to the naked eye or from the number on the scale. That’s where body composition tracking can support our total health and wellness.

Weight only tells a small part of your health story, and that’s why the perceptions of normal body weight are changing. Two people of the same height may have the exact same weight, but one might have significantly more body fat, while the other may have more lean mass. Body composition is the ratio of our muscle, bones, and body fat - and this ratio varies between every person because every body is different.

Getting a better view of our body composition, whether as a teen, a college athlete, or well into our 30s, 40s, can prove valuable in many ways. For starters, we can spot potential issues early, such as bone depletion or muscle loss, and address those issues through diet, exercise, and other lifestyle changes before they get worse.

Knowing where you stand in terms of body composition may also motivate us to adopt or maintain healthy habits. It gives us a picture of how our decisions may impact our physical health (e.g., eating more protein to increase muscle mass). We’ll have a better idea of what’s working well for us and what we might need to change to get the results we want.

Making body composition tracking part of our overall wellness plan can make all of our other efforts make more sense. From the foods we eat to the exercises we do, we can make the right choices based on what our bodies needs.

Final Thoughts

The case for building wellness at an early age is strong. When we turn a task or activity into a habit, we’re more likely to stick with those habits even when we face distractions, disruptions, stress, or anything else that can break our focus. It becomes as natural as brushing our teeth in the morning or washing our hands after we use the bathroom. It’s not something we have to think about or work hard at. We just do it!

Imagine what will happen when we build on basic habits like toothbrushing and handwashing to live even healthier lives at an early age. Exercise might feel less like a chore and more like something we want to do. Annual checkups and body composition lab scans could be something we look forward to, and health and wellness may turn into something we think about every day when making decisions - instead of only focusing on it when we’re feeling sick.

No matter our age now, it’s never too early to make wellness a habit!