At a glance…
- Ali Daddo has returned to host season two of Gen Well.
- The series follows 10 multigenerational Australian families as they explore what it means to feel well at any age.
- Ali shares with The Weekly the health and wellbeing lessons that have stuck with her.
There’s no shortage of advice telling us how to be healthier these days. But after two seasons of talking to families and experts about health and wellbeing on Gen Well, Ali Daddo has come to a simple conclusion.
“I think the biggest thing is that ageing well can be far less complicated than we sometimes make it out to be,” the 56-year-old tells The Australian Women’s Weekly.
“We’re constantly being told that there’s the newest treatment and there’s a supplement for this and that. And I just find that on Gen Well, we came back to a lot of the basics, which I really love. It’s move your body, maintain strength, eat well, sleep well and stay connected to the people that you love.”
And, she adds, “it can be fun. I think we forget that wellness can actually be fun.”
The second season of the BINGE series, which is out now, follows 10 multigenerational Australian families as they explore different areas of health and wellbeing. And along the way, Ali says there are a few lessons that have stuck with her.
It doesn’t have to be all or nothing
One of Ali’s biggest takeaways from the show has been how she approaches health.
“I used to believe that getting healthy meant finding just that one thing that was going to fix it,” she says.
But sleep, exercise, stress, food and connection aren’t separate boxes, she points out. “If you’re not sleeping, you might not have the energy to exercise. And if you’re isolated or stressed, that can affect how you eat and how you sleep. And if you move your body, of course your mood can improve.”
Stress was one thing that kept coming up throughout the series, and Ali says it’s something she’s become more conscious of in her own life.
“We push through so many things and just ignore our mental health and ignore the stress until our body has to get really, really loud. So I’m trying to sort of catch my stress before it gets so loud that my body… goes, ‘Actually, Ali, you need to stop.’”
And while that can make looking after your health feel like a lot, Ali stresses it doesn’t mean you have to do everything at once.
“I might not have gone and done an hour at the gym, but maybe I’m going to floss my teeth really well today, and that’s a step towards wellness,” she says.
“Because it can feel so bloody overwhelming. Just to go, ‘I’ve ticked a box in that sense. I’ve done something for my health today,’ and I can just keep growing off of that.”
It’s a message she thinks women in particular might need to hear. She notes that women can be “incredibly good at looking after everybody else” but “spectacularly bad” at putting themselves on their own list of care.
Her advice? “Just start with some simple, small things that you can pat yourself on the back for and go, ‘Yeah, I did that today.’”
Health looks different as you get older
Now in her 50s, Ali’s health and wellbeing priorities have changed.
“My idea of ageing well is very different to what I thought about being healthy at 26,” she says. “Now I’m 56.”
Back then, she says, the question was: “How do I look fit?” These days, it’s about what her body allows her to do.
“I really want to be strong, and I want energy, and I want my brain to work, and I want to be able to sleep well and laugh a lot and walk and travel,” she adds.
“I’m probably approaching grandmother years, I’d say, in the next five years, I’m hoping. My God, I really want to be able to run with the grandkids. And so that’s the way I think of wellness now.”
For Ali, looking after her health now is also about the life she wants to be living years from now.
“Think about your future self and what you can put into and take care of your body now. We’re living longer, but we want to live longer well.”
It’s never too late to start
Some of Ali’s favourite moments this season were seeing older members of the families trying new things – such as 89-year-old great-grandfather Bruce, who still regularly runs, try ballet and Michael, 82, giving the trapeze a go with his family.
“Hearing those kind of stories were just really, really impactful,” she says. “And how vital Bruce was because he kept moving his body, and he just had a real little sparkle in his eye. I remember coming home going, ‘Yeah, that’s the key. It’s just, like, keep moving. Just keep moving.’”
It also showed her that looking after yourself doesn’t have to mean doing something gruelling or expensive. Across the series, families try everything from forest bathing to hula hooping, with a focus on finding simple ways to move and have fun.
“Being well doesn’t have to cost a lot of money. There’s things that you can do for yourself now that are super simple, like the Japanese forest bathing, which I just love,” she says.
And one message in particular has stayed with her: “It’s just never too late to start looking after yourself.”
“There were grandmothers and grandfathers trying new things for the very first time,” she says. “So I hope that inspires some older people to go, ‘Oh, I want to try that.’ That would be really wonderful.”
Gen Well season two is streaming now on BINGE.
