Sometimes I go to write an article for Inc.com, and I find a really interesting story or a study to think about, and then I catch a weird detail that stops me in my tracks.

That’s what happened tonight. I saw that researchers at NYU Langone Health had dug into data from more than 12,000 people to see how many wound up developing dementia later in life—and then correlated that unfortunate outcome with some of their conditions and choices in middle age.

We’ll get to the three things they found were associated with significantly fewer dementia-free years shortly. For now, let me explain the track-stopping part.

It’s that when I look in the mirror, the version of myself I see is almost exactly the same version I saw when I was about 25 years old. The only difference is that my mix of red and brown hair was replaced by a mix of red and brown and blond and gray.

Fair enough, I suppose, since I’m literally a bit over twice the age that I was then; my point is that I still feel young.

But then I realized the average age of the participants when the NYU Langone Health researchers assessed these midlife risk factors.

Reader, it was 56. I’m 55. Wait: Dementia? In young people my age?

I don’t mean to joke, except for the fact that sometimes the only way to deal with absolute unbridled horror is to stare it in the face and laugh.

Still, I can joke and be serious at the same time, so I went straight to the three conditions and choices the good people at NYU Langone Health said mattered.

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