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Are Your Bones Aging Faster Than You Are? Here’s Why It Matters.

July 26, 2026

Most people don’t realize they have a bone problem until something goes wrong.  

The average age for suffering a fracture is shockingly young—only 57 years old.¹ 

And the first sign of osteoporosis often involves a trip to the ER. A hip cracks during a fall, or a vertebra breaks while bending forward to tie a shoe. 

Bone disease can even develop in people who are seemingly doing everything right. 

That’s because the so-called “right things”—especially leisurely walking and loads of calcium-rich dairy—don’t actually protect bones as much as previously thought.

Luckily, several underappreciated lifestyle strategies can help you protect your bones well into your seventies, eighties, and nineties. 

And the sooner you start, the more impact they’ll have. 

How Bones Age

Since the day you were born, your body has been continually replacing bone. 

Specialized cells (called osteoclasts) first remove old bone tissue, leaving behind small cavities. Then, other cells (called osteoblasts) fill in the empty pockets with collagen and minerals. 

Up until around age 30, your body adds more new bone than it removes. That’s what allows children’s bones to lengthen and thicken. 

Somewhere around age 30, however, bone plateaus: Bone formation roughly matches bone breakdown. 

At midlife, bone breakdown starts to outpace bone formation—aka bone density begins to decline. 

• In women, this accelerates around menopause, when estrogen levels fall. After around age 54, bone continues to decline on a more gradual basis until end of life. 
  
  
• In men, midlife bone loss also occurs, but more slowly and without the steep drop of menopause. 

Several additional factors play a role here. For example:  

• As you age, your skin makes less of the bone-protecting hormone vitamin D when exposed to sunlight.²
  
  
• Your intestines absorb fewer of the minerals needed to form new bone.³
  
  
• Levels of deep belly fat and inflammation tend to rise, further contributing to bone loss.^4,5

On top of all that, some people take actions that can accelerate bone loss even further. A variety of prescription medicines—including steroids and acid-blocking medication—can interfere with bone health. Tobacco use, excessive alcohol intake, and rapid weight loss are all associated with low bone mass and increased fractures.^6–8

Loss of bone mass and density can eventually progress to osteoporosis. 

Osteoporosis means “porous bone.” As it develops, small crevices proliferate, much like potholes on a road after a long, icy winter. As the potholes multiply, bones become more porous, brittle, and weak. 

All of this happens silently, meaning many people don’t get diagnosed until they’ve already experienced a fracture. 

The Silent Longevity Thief 

Your bones are a powerful longevity factor—and breaking a bone is more than an inconvenience.  

A hip fracture can lead to lifelong immobility. Between 14% and 28% of people who break a hip die within a year.⁹

In the spine, weakened bones can cave in during routine activities—such as coughing or reaching for a dinner plate—leading to loss of height, a rounded posture, and, in some cases, searing back or neck pain.

Even if you never break a bone, osteoporosis or its precursor, osteopenia, could still shorten your life in other ways. People with low bone density tend to have stiffer, more diseased blood vessels.¹⁰ They’re also more likely to eventually be diagnosed with dementia.¹¹

Researchers are still unraveling the root causes of these connections. They don’t yet know whether weak bones cause heart disease, whether heart disease causes weakened bones, or whether some underlying factor raises the risk for developing both problems. 

However, one thing is clear: Bone health is linked to both lifespan and healthspan.¹²

The Bone Age Test Most Doctors Ignore 

The most important test to assess your overall bone health is the DEXA scan, a low-intensity X-ray. The resulting data is used to calculate a T-score, which compares your bone density to that of a 20- or 30-year-old with peak bone mass. Between 0 and -1 is considered healthy. Between -1 and -2.5 means you have osteopenia. A score below -2.5 indicates you have osteoporosis. 

The test is quick, painless, relatively cheap, and enormously informative. However, most guidelines only recommend the test for women aged 65 or older and men aged 70 or older.

That’s just too late—especially if you’re a woman or have risk factors like low body weight, a family history of osteoporosis, amenorrhea, thyroid issues, long‑term use of steroids, or a history of endurance training without strength work.

I recommend getting your first DEXA scan earlier, in your forties if you can. If you catch bone loss early, you have an opportunity to slow or even reverse it. 

If your baseline is solid, repeat every 3–5 years. If the scan reveals osteopenia or osteoporosis, or you’re peri‑ or postmenopausal, tighten that to every 1–2 years to track your response to treatment. 

The True Bone Protection Formula 

The older you get, the harder it becomes to reverse bone loss. That’s why it’s so important to start protecting bones as soon as you can—though it’s never too late. 

However, many people rely on strategies that don’t actually work. 

You may have heard, for example, that drinking calcium-rich milk and doing plenty of walking is enough to protect your bones. Unfortunately, that’s just not true. 

While your body certainly needs some calcium, it likely doesn’t need as much as previously thought¹³—and other dietary strategies can be more influential. (More on this in a moment.) 

Similarly, while walking is certainly better than being sedentary, this level of activity likely isn’t enough to maintain bone mass, especially after age 50.¹⁴ There are a lot of other pluses to light walking, so don’t give it up if you’re already in a routine—but augment those walks with the five bone-building strategies below. 

Strategy #1: Embrace Resistance Training

Strength training puts mechanical stress on bones and muscles throughout your body, encouraging both to grow stronger.¹⁵ 

All types of weight-bearing activity—including some forms of cardiovascular exercise—can stress the bones and muscles in this way. However, strength training is unique in that it targets your entire body, including your spine, wrists, and hips—areas that are most likely to fracture. It can also enhance your strength and stability, helping to reduce the risk of falls that lead to fractures. 

▶ Include at least two days of strength training each week. If you’re new to strength training, consider signing up for a few sessions with a trainer to learn some basic movements and work on your form. 

If you’ve been diagnosed with osteopenia or osteoporosis, ask your doctor for a referral to a physical therapist or a qualified trainer who can show you how to train safely to rebuild bone density.  

For optimal bone health, you’ll eventually want to challenge yourself with progressively heavy resistance training, working your way up to a weight you can only lift about five times. This is a proven bone builder.¹⁶

Strategy #2: Include Impact Training, If Possible

Impact training generally involves striking an object with force. It includes squat and lunge jumps, jumping jacks, skipping, weighted step-ups, punching, jump rope, and medicine ball slams, throws, and catches, among other high-impact activities. These activities have been shown to maintain and, in some cases, improve bone mineral density in postmenopausal women.¹⁷

▶ Listen to your body as you add impact. High-impact activities can protect bone strength, but they can also aggravate osteoarthritis and increase the risk of fracture in people with moderate to severe osteoporosis. If you’ve been diagnosed with osteoporosis or osteoarthritis, ask your doctor for a referral to a physical therapist who can help you learn how to adapt these exercises to protect your joints and bones.

Strategy #3: Beef Up Your Protein Intake 

In addition to minerals like calcium and magnesium, bone is composed of protein. This important building block doesn’t materialize on its own; you must supply it by eating protein-rich foods. Unfortunately, most people don’t get enough. 

▶ Consume 1.2–1.6 grams of protein per kilogram of ideal body weight a day. For a 70-kilogram (154-pound) person, that is 84–112 grams of protein daily. This breaks down to about 30 grams per meal, with an extra protein-rich snack or two. 

If you struggle to get enough, check out How to Double Your Protein Intake. You can also consider a protein powder such as Designs for Health’s Chocolate Bone Broth Protein, Naked Goat’s Whey Protein Powder, or Paleovalley’s Grass-Fed Bone Broth Protein. 

Strategy #4: Take Vitamin D3 with K2

Your gut is lined with specialized cells that act as docking stations for vitamin D. When enough D docks at these stations, it improves mineral absorption, strengthens the intestinal barrier, and promotes the growth of beneficial gut bugs.¹⁸

Your skin can make D when exposed to sunlight, but many people avoid the sun because of skin cancer, sun damage, oxidative stress, and wrinkles. I’ve tested D levels in thousands of people. Based on that data, I can tell you that 80% of people have insufficient levels, including folks who live in Florida and other sunny climates.

▶ Take 2,000–5,000 IU of D3 daily. Combine it with vitamin K2, which helps activate the specialized cells mentioned earlier that add new bone. Vitamin D Supreme by Designs for Health combines D and K in a single capsule. 

Strategy #5: Prioritize Sleep

It’s during sleep that bones deposit new minerals and protein building blocks into those empty crevices mentioned earlier.¹⁹ When you cut sleep short, you may not give your body enough time to complete this important repair work. 

In one study, postmenopausal women who typically slept five or fewer hours were more likely to have low bone mass and osteoporosis than postmenopausal women who typically slept seven or more hours.²⁰

▶ Aim for 7 to 8 hours of shuteye a night. Need help in this department? Consider trying one of these easy sleep experiments.

References

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2. Giustina A, Bouillon R, Dawson-Hughes B, Ebeling PR, Lazaretti-Castro M, Lips P, et al. Vitamin D in the older population: a consensus statement. Endocrine. 2023 Jan;79(1):31–44.

3. Kassis A, Fichot MC, Horcajada MN, Horstman AMH, Duncan P, Bergonzelli G, et al. Nutritional and lifestyle management of the aging journey: A narrative review. Front Nutr. 2022;9:1087505.

4. Wergen N, Maus U, Schultz K, Frohnhofen H, Latz D, Somsen C, et al. The role of body composition and visceral fat in osteoporosis subtype differentiation: Insights from bioelectrical impedance analysis. J Orthop. 2025 Jul;65:276–82.

5. Fatima S, Talha M, Abrar M, Shaid F. Menopausal status-dependent alterations in bone mineral density in women transitioning from menopause to postmenopause: An observational multicenter study. Sage Open Aging. 2025 Jan;11(30495334251345095):30495334251345095.

6. Al-Bashaireh AM, Haddad LG, Weaver M, Chengguo X, Kelly DL, Yoon S. The effect of tobacco smoking on bone mass: An overview of pathophysiologic mechanisms. J Osteoporos. 2018 Dec 2;2018:1206235.

7. Godos J, Giampieri F, Chisari E, Micek A, Paladino N, Forbes-Hernández TY, et al. Alcohol consumption, bone mineral density, and risk of osteoporotic fractures: A dose-response meta-analysis. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2022 Jan 28;19(3):1515.

8. Liu H, Li B, Liu L, Ying W, Rosen CJ. Weight loss induced bone loss: mechanism of action and clinical implications. Bone Res. 2025 Dec 2;13(1):99.

9. Sing CW, Lin TC, Bartholomew S, Bell JS, Bennett C, Beyene K, et al. Global epidemiology of hip fractures: Secular trends in incidence rate, post-fracture treatment, and all-cause mortality. J Bone Miner Res. 2023 Aug;38(8):1064–75.

10. Raisi-Estabragh Z, Biasiolli L, Cooper J, Aung N, Fung K, Paiva JM, et al. Poor bone quality is associated with greater arterial stiffness: Insights from the UK Biobank. J Bone Miner Res. 2021 Jan;36(1):90–9.

11. Xiao T, Ghatan S, Mooldijk SS, Trajanoska K, Oei L, Gomez MM, et al. Association of bone mineral density and dementia: The Rotterdam study: The Rotterdam study. Neurology. 2023 May 16;100(20):e2125–33.

12. Dayer SR, Mears SC, Pangle AK, Mendiratta P, Wei JY, Azhar G. Does superior bone health promote a longer lifespan? Geriatr Orthop Surg Rehabil. 2021 Aug 3;12:21514593211036231.

13. Bolland MJ, Leung W, Tai V, Bastin S, Gamble GD, Grey A, et al. Calcium intake and risk of fracture: systematic review. BMJ. 2015 Sep 29;351:h4580.

14. Ma D, Wu L, He Z. Effects of walking on the preservation of bone mineral density in perimenopausal and postmenopausal women: a systematic review and meta-analysis: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Menopause. 2013 Nov;20(11):1216–26.

15. Hong AR, Kim SW. Effects of resistance exercise on bone health. Endocrinol Metab (Seoul). 2018 Dec;33(4):435–44.

16. Watson SL, Weeks BK, Weis LJ, Harding AT, Horan SA, Beck BR. High-intensity resistance and impact training improves bone mineral density and physical function in postmenopausal women with osteopenia and osteoporosis: The LIFTMOR randomized controlled trial: Heavy lifting improves bmd in osteoporosis. J Bone Miner Res. 2018 Feb;33(2):211–20.

17. Manaye S, Cheran K, Murthy C, Bornemann EA, Kamma HK, Alabbas M, et al. The role of high-intensity and high-impact exercises in improving bone health in postmenopausal women: A systematic review. Cureus. 2023 Feb;15(2):e34644.

18. Akimbekov NS, Digel I, Sherelkhan DK, Lutfor AB, Razzaque MS. Vitamin D and the host-gut microbiome: A brief overview. Acta Histochem Cytochem. 2020 Jun 26;53(3):33–42.

19. Swanson CM, Shea SA, Wolfe P, Cain SW, Munch M, Vujovic N, et al. Bone turnover markers after sleep restriction and circadian disruption: A mechanism for sleep-related bone loss in humans. J Clin Endocrinol Metab. 2017 Oct 1;102(10):3722–30.

20. Ochs-Balcom HM, Hovey KM, Andrews C, Cauley JA, Hale L, Li W, et al. Short sleep is associated with low bone mineral density and osteoporosis in the Women’s Health Initiative. J Bone Miner Res. 2020 Feb;35(2):261–8.