9 Ways to Fight Fatigue and Get your Energy Back

Aging changes your body’s cells in ways that can sap your energy. Here’s how fight fatigue

Jessica Migala, AARP

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Published August 04, 2025

Paul Spella (Getty Images)

Perky Passionate. Powerful. How much do those words describe you? In a 2025 meta-analysis, 3 out of 5 adults over 60 described themselves as being easily fatigued after doing normal activities. This slowdown isn’t healthy. Age-related fatigue is associated with increased mortality risk, due to the likelihood of physical decline and the development of conditions that impair your ability to do daily tasks.

It doesn’t have to be this way. Researchers who study energy metabolism say there are four (very doable) things that can help turn back the clock on your cells to restore your energy level — and maintain it well into your later years.

Why our batteries run low

Mitochondria are structures that act as the energy processors of our cells. Using the food we eat, they create a molecule called adenosine triphosphate (ATP), the chemical energy currency all our cells run on. “Mitochondria are not the only providers of energy, but they do the heavy lifting, especially when it comes to the activities of daily living,” explains Ian Lanza, professor of medicine at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Science in Rochester, Minnesota.

As we age, our cells become less efficient, putting increased demand on the mitochondria. “Cells burn more energy than they should to do the same amount of work. This is like a car engine that’s rusting — it needs to expend more energy to go the same distance,” says Martin Picard, a mitochondrial psychobiologist at Columbia University.

As your brain senses that your cells are in overdrive, it looks to conserve energy elsewhere: It slows down the process of rebuilding muscle, causing you to lose muscle mass. It reduces melanin production, leading to gray hair. And you naturally become less physically active, which atrophies muscles and encourages the body to make fewer mitochondria to save even more energy. This loss of natural energy, called the “brain-body conservation model of aging,” winds up backfiring by creating physical fatigue that diminishes the long-term health and vitality of your body. “This begins a spiraling down into frailty,” Picard says.

But this spiral isn’t inevitable.Lifestyle changes can increase the number of mitochondria and help keep your cells — and you — feeling more energetic.

1. Don’t stop moving

Like muscles, mitochondria work on a “use it or lose it” basis, says Lanza. “There are big differences in energy metabolism between people who have a sedentary lifestyle versus those who maintain physical activity,” he says. “When older adults are able to maintain healthy guideline-recommended levels of physical activity, there are fewer age-related deficits in mitochondrial function.”

Your move: Aim for the recommended 150 minutes of moderate-intensity activity, plus two days of muscle-strengthening activity, per week. How do you know if you’re working hard enough? “If you do something and find you’re breathing harder—going upstairs, walking somewhere, having sex — you’re stimulating your mitochondria,” says Picard.

2. Suss out sleep struggles

With age, sleep isn’t as deep, long or consolidated, says Aric Prather, a professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the University of California, San Francisco, and author of The Sleep Prescription. “Sleep lives in the brain. Like everything else, our brain ages,” he says, which may be why we see sleep change in the fifth decade of life and beyond. These changes can make sleep feel less restorative — and there’s evidence that sleep loss may also accelerate cellular aging.

Your move: If you feel run-down during the day despite being in bed for seven-plus hours a night, you need to rule out any relevant medical conditions or disorders, like obstructive sleep apnea, Prather says. Medications can also interfere with sleep or cause daytime drowsiness, so ask your doctor if you should take your pills at different times of day or before bed. Avoid dozing or catnapping by structuring your day with planned activities. This allows sleep to be pushed into the night, where it can get to work on cellular repair and regeneration.

3. Narrow your eating window

Too much food is an “energetic burden” to the body, says Picard, since it has to expend energy to handle additional calories. “Eating more doesn’t give you more energy, it actually steals your energy,” he says.

Intermittent fasting (IF), which essentially means putting guardrails around the time you eat, has two main benefits. One, restricting eating to an eight-hour window tends to reduce your daily intake of calories. Two, IF improves autophagy — the process by which cells clear out trash, like free radicals. “Intermittent fasting activates autophagy to bring cellular balance back to health by getting rid of damaged mitochondria,” explains Rajat Singh, M.D., a professor of medicine and director of the Comprehensive Liver Research Center at UCLA.

Your move: Research suggests there are benefits to a 16-to-8 IF schedule, where you fast for 16 hours and eat within an eight-hour window. However, long-term IF isn’t sustainable for everyone, especially older adults. For best results, find a fasting period that works for you and that you can stick with, says Singh. (And, of course, get clearance from your doctor first.) Maybe that’s 12 hours of fasting — from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m., for example — coupled with regular exercise. The key is consistency.

4. Talk to more people

You know how being stressed and overwhelmed can lead to feeling fatigued? That’s evidence that your state of mind is affecting your mitochondria, says Picard.

“People who feel more positive about life have more mitochondria with greater capacity for energy transformation than people who have no purpose and fewer positive life experiences,” he says. Positive states of mind may increase biological energy through the mitochondria, helping you feel more alive.

Your move: Just eight hours of solitude can be enough to drag down your energy. Call a friend, send your kids a text, get together to play cards. “These are all things that keep brain and muscle networks active to diminish the hallmarks of aging,” says Christiaan Leeuwenburgh, a professor at the University of Florida’s Institute on Aging. Focus on new activities and breaking routines. Ask a friend or neighbor what they’re doing tomorrow — and don’t hesitate to ask if you can join them.