Getting older is a part of life that everyone will experience at some point.  With this greater achievement in years comes many hardships.  Some will be minor and others will be a real hurdle, such as diseases that run in the family.  The good news is that there are things that you can do to age gracefully and fairly trouble free.  Learning how to eat well, take the proper nutritional supplements and vitamins, controlling stress, and exercising can prevent many problems associated with aging.

Habits are hard to break, remember the phrase “people do not change”.  However with real determination this can be done.  Typically it takes 21 days for a behavior to become a habit.  Want to start exercising and make it a lifestyle?  Start working out everyday, by day 21 you will not really be able to stop, the mental pressure of going will be so great that all of the excuses that you made in the past will be non existent.
There are many factors that will determine what your golden years will be like.  One of these is your family medical history.  What types of conditions existed in the past with your family members from previous generations.  Even though your genetically at risk, this can be undone by finding out early and being proactive.  See your family doctor and discuss healthy lifestyle changes that will keep you away from the diseases that plagued previous family members.

Another and probably most important factor to healthy aging is exercise.  Most of your vital organs after the age of 50 start working at less capacity and this keeps decreasing as you continue aging.  Therefore if your already healthier at that age than your peers, you will fell it less.  Exercise will help your joints stay lubricated, keep your bones strong, and will help maintain muscle mass.  On the average people lose 3-5 lbs of muscle mass per year after age 35-40.  By weight training and consuming the right amount of protein in your diet you can reverse this and actually gain muscle.  This will sculpt your whole body, and make you a fat burning machine.  The more muscle mass you have on your body the greater your metabolism even while you sleep.  Exercise will also help you relieve stress and keep your sexual function healthy.
Lastly it is really important to keep your brain active.  You have the phrase “use it or lose it”, couldn’t be more true here.  Try to keep your brain as active as possible by doing things such as reading, crossword puzzles, playing cards, or playing strategy games.  A supplement called Gingko Biloba, is also very beneficial for brain health and concentration as well as Omega 3-6-9 supplements.

By incorporating these lifestyle changes you will be able to age healthy and may even increase your life span.

In a recent study of healthy older adults who were lifting weights regularly who were weight training for at least 3 months, and taking a prescribed dose of ibuprofen and acetaminophen had a much greater increase over the non active placebo group in quadriceps muscle mass and strength.
The study was conducted at the Human Performance Laboratory at Ball State University in Muncie Indiana. The study was conducted by Dr. Trappe and a postdoctoral student Dr. Chad C. Carroll. They reported the study at the annual American Physiological Society meeting conference in San Diego for Experimental Biology.

They showed that taking acetaminophen (Tylenol) or ibuprofen (Advil) during consistent weight resistance training reduced the metabolic response within the muscle which allowed the muscle to grow larger and resulted in considerable strength gains of the subjects. The study was conducted over the course of 12 weeks and was supervised. The subjects were men aged 60 to 78 years old, and performed weight training activities three times per week for 15 to 20 minute intervals. The doses used on the subjects were 1200 milligrams of ibuprofen and 4000 milligrams of acetaminophen, which is the current limit for over the counter use of the products. The ibuprofen group showed a much greater response over the acetaminophen group.

In past research when muscle protein synthesis was measured over a 24 hour period there were negative affects from the painkillers due to the blocking of the COX enzyme, which is necessary for protein synthesis. As we age muscle tissue starts to deteriorate and there are certain nutritional supplements that can help this catabolic state. Some of these include L-glutamine, Branch Chain Amino Acids, Free Form Amino Acids, And Whey Protein. We will be discussing these supplements in a future article which will focus on sparing muscle as we age.

If you’re experiencing symptoms of acid reflux, regularly have chest pains even though your heart checks out fine, or you find it difficult to breathe after eating, you may have a form of gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD). Read the rest of this entry »