How to live beyond 100 years, by doctor who buried wife, two children and 4,000 patients

By Dr Howard Tucker

Before doctor Howard Tucker takes the floor, I would like to thank Alfa Aliu for sharing with me the video message of De Tucker. Alfa Aliu is a long standing member of the KUSA GREEN PASRURE HERBS Chat Platform. We have been acquainted since his work days at The NIGERIAN Ports Authority Headquarters in Lagos. In retirement, he is a farmer in Minna. My thanks to him offered, Dr Howard Tucker has the floor…

“l watched 4,000 patients die over 53 years of practising medicine. I signed their death certificates. I held their hands in their final hours. I told their families, and I am going to tell you something that most of those people had in common. They did not have to die when they did, not from genetics not from bad luck, but from choices.

“Exposed patterns I first identified in 1972. Exposed behavior I warned patients about for decades. Most of them did not listen. Now, most of them are gone. I am 102 years old. I am not telling you this because I want your sympathy. I am telling you this because I need you to understand that I have spent more time with dying people than almost anyone alive today and I know exactly what separates the ones who made it to ninety from those who dropped dead at sixty-eight. You are probably doing at least two of three things right now today, and you probably have no idea they are shaving years of your life.

“The first thing I learned in 53 years of medicine is that sitting will kill you faster than almost anything else. This is not an exaggeration. I watched it happen in real time patient after patient. In 1981, I started keeping separate notes on my patients who sat for work versus those who moved. Accountants, secretaries and executives. They aged differently. Their blood work looked different. Their hearts failed sooner. By 1990, I had enough data to know that someone sitting 8-9 hours daily was aging internally about 40% faster than someone who moved throughout the day. The medical literature caught up eventually. I saw it first in the bodies of my patients.

“ Here is what happens. You sit, your circulation slows, blood pools in your legs. Your lymphatic system which depends on movement to function stagnates, toxins accumulate, your muscles begin to atrophy within days of reduced use. After age sixty, this process accelerates dramatically because your body loses the resilience it has at 40.

“I had a patient, a retired judge who exercised every morning for 45 minutes religiously. He thought he was safe but he sat reading and watching television for 10 or 11 hours after that. He was dead at 71. A stroke. His morning exercises did not protect him from his afternoon stillness. The solution is not complicated. Do something that requires your legs. I have done this since 1974. I set a timer. Every 50 minutes, I get up. I am 102 and I still do this.

“The second identified was sleep. Not just getting enough sleep but getting the right kind. I cannot tell you how many patients told me they only needed five or six hours. They said it with pride like it was a sign of strength. It was… delusion. Your brain requires seven to nine hours to complete its repair cycles. During deep sleep, your lymphatic system flushes out metabolic waste including the proteins associated with cognitive decline. When you consistently cut your sleep short, you are allowing these toxins to accumulate night after night after night. I watched patients who slept poorly and developed memory problems for a full decade earlier than those who slept well. The correlation was so strong, I could almost predict who would start to fall victim based on this finding. Here is something research is only now confirming. Broken sleep is worse than short sleep. Waking up 4 or 5 times per night even briefly prevents you from reaching the deep stages where restoration happens. Many of my patients did not even know they were weakening, but their spouses knew. If you wake up weak after 8 hours in bed, something is wrong.

“The third thing that kills people after 60 is loneliness. This sounds soft. It is not. Loneliness triggers a chronic stress response in your body. Your cortisol remains elevated. Your immune function decreases. Your inflammation markers rise. I had patients who were otherwise healthy but lived alone with no meaningful connection.

“They deteriorated faster than patients with strong social bonds. The data on this is overwhelming now. But I saw it clinically for decades. Humans are not designed to be isolated. After 60, when you lose a spouse or Friend, you start dying, the risk of isolation increases dramatically. You have to fight it actively. Join something, call someone. Do not let days pass without a real conversation.

“The fourth pattern involves food and this one makes me angry because the advice my profession gave for 40 years was wrong. We told people to eat low fat. We told them whole grains were healthy. We told them orange juice was good for them. We created generation of seniors eating toast and jam and cereal and wondering why the blood sugar was out of control. After age 60, your metabolism changes. Your insulin sensitivity decreases. Your ability to process carbohydrates diminishes. Foods that were fine at 40 became inflammatory at 70. I changed my own diet at 65 when I started seeing the patterns. I eliminated processed carbohydrates. I focused on healthy fats and protein. My inflammatory markers dropped within three months. I recommend the same to my patients who would listen. Most would not. They trusted the old advice. Many of them are gone.

“The fifth thing is Chronic worry. This one is subtle because it does not look like a problem. It looks like a personality trait. But constant low level anxiety keeps your stress hormones elevated in a way that damages every system in your body. I had patients who were to retire and comfortably surrounded by family but who were worrying about things they could not control. Their bodies aged faster. Their sleep was worse. Their immune systems were compromised. Learning to let go what you cannot control is not just good psychology, it is survival.

“I want to tell you something about my wife. She died eight years ago. We were married for 61years. She did not follow any of this advice. She sat constantly because her knees hurt. She slept poorly and refused to correct it. She ate as her mother taught her, bread and low fats. She worried about her children and grand children every single day. She died at the age of 94. You might think 94 is a good age, but I watched her decline for 15 years before that. I watched her lose her mobility, sharpness and her independence. Those final years were not a gift. They were slow diminishment. She could have had another decade of real life. She chose not to change. I am 102. I live alone. I cook my meals. I walk every day. I read. I call my grand children. I sleep seven and half hours. I am not special. I am not lucky. I made a choice. You are making choices right now, today, this hour. And I am telling you from 53 years of watching people die, those choices matter than what you believe. You do not have to change everything. Pick one thing. the sitting, the food, the sleep, or the isolation or the worry. Fix one and the others become easier. I have buried two out of my three children. I have buried my wife. I buried 4,000 patients. I am still here. And I am telling you that most of the people I buried did not have to go when they did. You are still here, too.. what are you going to do?

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