Cosmetic surgery might be the quickest way to reclaim a young, healthy look, but it's not the only way. If you focus on correcting the behaviors that add years and harm your health, you can turn back the clock. Here, the 10 unhealthy behaviors mentioned most often by anti-aging experts ‑- and how to reform yourself.

Feeling overwhelmed by stress
Since caveperson times, we've known excess stress lowers our immunity, boosts the risk of heart disease and generally makes us feel crummy. But now Elissa S. Epel, PhD, a professor of psychiatry at the University of California at San Francisco, has cell-level proof that too much stress triggers premature aging of the immune system. Mothers of chronically ill children who felt most stressed, she found, had the most extreme early aging of these cells. To unwind? "The first step is realizing you are stressed and noticing the signs ‑- you might feel your heart racing, or feel sweaty," Dr. Epel says. "The short-term way to reduce stress is to do deep breathing, what we call diaphragmatic breathing." The longer-term fix: "Make time in your life to do things that reduce stress."

Drinking too much alcohol ‑- or drinking too little
It's no accident that alcohol advice is following the bad news about stress. Putting your feet up and having a tall cold one is actually good for you. One or two drinks a day can lower the risk of dying from heart disease by a third or so, a study in the American Journal of Epidemiology found. Women are advised to limit intake to one a day, men to two. But don't imbibe more than that, or you'll up the risks of ill health, including strokes and cancers of the liver, throat and breast.