This article is written in partnership with AlgaeCal. They’re dedicated to creating a bone health revolution, and we’re honored to work with them. ~ ed.

I decided long ago: I’m going to be strong and active until the day I die.

I made up my mind at my first yoga class. I was 19 and the teacher was in her 70s—fierce and elegantly poised. That’s the kind of 70-something I want to be.

So, I made my health a priority. I run. I lift weights. I still practice yoga. I follow Michael Pollan’s advice and “eat real food, mostly plants, not too much.” I also take a few supplements.

But there’s one key to aging well that I haven’t paid much attention to until recently: my bone health.

And I’m not alone. Most of us are not getting enough of arguably the most important nutrient in our bodies. One study suggests as much as 68% of the American population is calcium deficient.

Calcium isn’t the whole picture, though. And we don’t need as much of it as we think, either.

Take this step to stay fierce & elegantly poised well into your 70s & beyond >>

So, what’s the secret to maintaining the kind of strong, healthy bones that’ll keep us fierce and elegantly poised well into our 70s and beyond? The right balance of calcium and 12 other essential bone-supporting nutrients—magnesium, boron, copper, manganese, silicon, nickel, selenium, strontium, phosphorus, potassium, vanadium, and zinc.

That may sound like an awful lot, but it’s much easier to get than most people realize.

And you don’t have to make special shopping trips or go out of your way to get them either. More on that in a moment…

This is good news for women like me who believe life is for living, and refuse to accept weak, fragile bones as “just a part of getting old.”

Like my first yoga teacher, I’ve always admired women who take ownership of their well-being and advocate for themselves. They choose to live an active and healthy lifestyle that keeps them younger in body and mind. Not because of “anti-aging” media messaging, but because it feels good.

It feels good to value our health, to be strong and capable long into our elderhood, and to age on our own terms.

The plant-based bone supplement that helps you age on your own terms >>

Joanna Bangor of San Diego, California is one such woman.

When faced with a seemingly hopeless diagnosis, she decided to take her destiny into her own hands. Her story is proof that we can choose how we age.

In 2008, Joanna’s doctor told her that she needed to do something to help her bones because they were starting to thin. This was a scary moment for her.

She had watched her mother struggle with bone loss, and the conventional treatments prescribed only seemed to make things worse. She slowly got smaller, more hunched over, less vibrant, and more crippled until she woke up one day, stood on her leg, and it broke.

It’s heartbreaking to see someone you love crumble, but it’s also one hell of a wake-up call.

When Joanna’s doctor said she wanted to have Joanna follow the same protocol her mother had been on, she got a flash of herself in the same position 30 to 40 years down the line. That’s when she decided she just wasn’t going to let that happen.

She told her doctor, “I got to find something else,” and started doing her own research. She took mega doses of every type of calcium she could find, thinking she needed as much as she could get to avoid ending up like her mom. But bone scans showed it wasn’t working.

Then she discovered AlgaeCal, who offer the only supplement shown in clinical studies to increase your bone density. (And do it in as little as six months.) And it changed everything.

AlgaeCal sustainably hand-harvests Lithothamnion superpostium—a South American marine algae that contains all 13 of the essential bone-building minerals I mentioned earlier. The algae is sustainably hand-harvested to preserve the balance of nutrients, only adding vitamins C, D3, and K2-7 to round out the bone-building benefits.

After a year of taking it religiously, she went back to her doctor. And the results? She had stabilized one area of bone loss and increased her density in another area.

Start addressing your bone health now >>

And Joanna’s journey is not unique.

Recently, a fellow editor shared her aunt Margaret’s experience with bone loss, even as a fit and active woman working in healthcare. She, too, transformed her bone health with AlgaeCal, and she has the bone scans to prove it.

There are many other amazing women like Joanna and Margaret who have educated themselves, taken their lives back into their own hands, and used AlgaeCal to fight their way back to vibrant health and strength.

Their success stories are inspiring. When I hear them, I feel the same way I did that day at my first yoga class.

There is another way to age. We don’t have to crumble through the years. We can be strong, active, and vital. We can do the things we want to do, for as long as we want to do them.

And, as Joanna says, “That takes away a lot of fear for the future. I feel happier, and I feel stronger. And that’s everything to me.”