Anti Ageing Research

Anti Ageing Concepts and Research

The topic of Anti Ageing is a vital part within the field of General Health and Prevention.

article by Dieter Luske

Author of It happened in the seventies

Anti Ageing Concepts

As you will have noticed already, ( Anti Ageing part 1) Anti Ageing is not just focused on age, it is much more concentrating on generating health, which has the obvious 'side-effect' of living longer .... now .. that's the kind of side-effect I like.

We have discussed the first principle of the Anti Ageing Concepts, now lets continue with the second principle;

Concept & Principles:

Adopt an individual general healthy lifestyle, including nutrition - exercise - attitude

We will discuss > Fasting - Intermittent Fasting - Mono Diet - under-eating - insulin resistance & inflammation.

Now that you have cut down or eliminated processed and refined foods, (have you?) time has come to have a close look at your diet.

I am not a great friend of suggesting "one" specific diet for everyone, and claiming that this is the diet to make sure that everyone is living a long and healthy life.

I believe more in individual diets that are based on general healthy diet principles. I will discuss possible specific Anti Ageing foods at a later time. In the meantime, if you would like to check out on basic diet suggestion, please read; Balanced Zonal Type Diet, similar to the Mediterranean Diet, with less grains.

Lets assume for the moment, you have developed your own suitable healthy diet, and now you are looking for something to enhance your health to a greater more Sustainable and Anti-aging kind of principle.

It's time to look and understand the age-old practice of "Fasting", and more specifically "Intermittent fasting"

The different levels of Fasting:

Fasting is nothing new, what may be new is the scientific research and application for fasting.

In Germany, lots of clinics have "Heil Fasting" - Healing Fasting - as their main treatment. In fact whole townships are specialised in fasting and special "Cures", so called "Kur Orte", or Cure Towns.

I used to fast for great length of time many years ago, I believed it was good for me, and I can acknowledge its detoxifying principles. However, I had no idea about the supposed Anti-Ageing effects or how to apply fasting in specific ways.

I fasted, lost some weight, basically felt as good as before, and ticked fasting off my list; have been there, have done that, lets move on.

At that time, my understanding was, that you had to fast at least a 3 full days, and up to 3 weeks, the main reason being to trigger a detoxifying and healing action.

Later I learnt, that while that may be true, certain nutrients may need to be present at time of fasting to assist the liver in it's high energy detoxifying action demands. With other words, fasting started to become complicated, you had to know more or less, how to fast, what kind of nutrients to consume to assist your body and to avoid possible harmful side effects.

For most people, that type of fast presents itself with a huge mental hurdle ... 3 days or longer without food, it's not that easy for most people.

On a personal note.. when I was 19, I had some serious stomach ulcers, my Doctor wanted me in Hospital. Instead I went on a Macrobiotic Diet, which completely resolved my stomach ulcer problems as well as some other minor issues. - It was only much later, that I realised that it wasn't exactly the diet that cured my Stomach ulcer, it was the fact, that at the beginning of that new diet, I ate only brown rice for about 4 weeks.

With other words, I was fasting without knowing it. - Another word for such a fast is > Mono Diet.

The other important aspect of a fast or mono diet is that food allergies and sensitivities are eliminated during that time. This aspect is an important fact to acknowledge; for whenever you fast, even if it is for only one day, you will eliminate food allergies and other digestive reaction from your system.

You may say, Intermittent Fasting is your Health and Digestive Reset Button.

How has fasting knowledge be changed and developed?

Intermittent Fasting has been included within a general diet. That means, fasting needs to be done at regular intervals to be effective in the long term.
We are all different creatures, and therefore have different requirements or different likes and dislikes. Fasting for health and anti-ageing principles can be done in many ways, it's up to you which method you feel most comfortable with.

3 day complete Fast
This method is suitable for people who have no problems with a longer fast, it may not suit people with a heavy physical job or with other commitments, where a 3 day fast is just not feasible.
For a long-term effect, the 3 day fast should be repeated 4 times a year.
Intermittent Fasting - Eat one day, fast the next.
This method is not for the faint hearted, and most people who use this method add some low calorie food within the fast day. As the name suggest, it is an alternating day fast, continuing indefinitely.
The 5 day eat, 2 day fasting method. ( Intermittent Fasting )
At lot of people like this method, esp as it allows some low calorie food on your fasting days
The 1 day fast (24hour fast) ( Intermittent Fasting )
This one too, is adopted by many people, just one day fast, seems to be easy for a lot of people, interestingly this method seems to generate a lot of instant "feeling better" reports.
This method can be likened to the one day fruit fast, or one day raw food fast or similar 1 day fasting applications, but there is one main difference .. you may try to avoid fruit, it's too high in sugar.
The Mono Diet
Limiting your food intake to only One or a few different foods, basically means that you are fasting. Be careful if you intent doing that for a long time, severe mal-nutrition may result. However, it can be applied like a fast for a short time period, with similar benefits. A Mono Diet is also a good way to follow up with allergy testing, and it can be seen as a low calorie eating plan.

The under-eating principle

There are a lot of Anti-Ageing products and information, but the “only” scientifically proven Anti-Ageing principle is that of under-eating.

Some people actually follow a very low calorie diet, and they are very healthy, however it is a very involved diet. It's not just cutting down on food, the reminding food needs to supply all what is essential. Therefore, the principles of under-eating is one reason for the easier intermittent fasting applications.

The other important fact, is "sugar reduction", and creating a healthy metabolism. In fact, many pre Diabetes and late onset Diabetes sufferers have reported being “cured”.

Sugar or the sugar metabolism, seem to be the main culprit against health and healthy ageing. I am sure you know about "Insulin Resistance" or the "Metabolic Syndrome" .. if not you can read up on it here >>> Metabolic Syndrome

Years ago, everyone was talking about a "low blood sugar" issue, this is still valid, but later research has identified the Metabolic Syndrome as the more important factor.

Now, look at fasting again..... part of fasting is to eliminate sugar. - The consequences are, that your metabolism will change. With no free flowing sugar / glucose available, your body will burn fat instead, thereby re-setting your metabolism to a more effective metabolism.

Lets discuss for a moment the main culprit of ageing, Inflammation.

Inflammation can be likened to something burning, you need to burn something to produce energy. If that process is artificially stimulated by sugar, diet, stress, injury, chronic diseases and other inflammatory issues, your body will "burn" faster. This is what we try to prevent, basically speaking, if we burn slower, we will live longer. - This may not be totally correct scientifically but it is a good analogy.

To reset your metabolism, esp with the 1 day fast, one should stay off sugar, therefore a one day fruit fast may have some detoxifying principles, but may not be good for your sugar metabolism.

By the way, a simple test to see if you have a possible metabolic syndrome, is to look at your waist.

Any excess fat around your abdominal area is a sign that your health can be improved.

There has been a lot of Media attention in regards to the 1 or 2 day fasting principles, and as usual, the emphasis was at weight reduction and less on health.

Part of the message was, that you can eat what ever you would like, as long, as you fast 1 or 2 day per week.

Frankly, I wouldn't recommend that at all, it's a bit like; "take this pill and eat what you like."

These types of principles are usually targeted at people who may otherwise not even try a diet. Unfortunately, those people will not have a positive outcome, which may lead to negative feedback, where people will rubbish a valid lifestyle choice.

Therefore, if you do embark on a fasting type eating style, do it in the best possible way, which is free of sugar or other undesired foods.

Next Article > Metabolic Syndrome - the fattest nation on Earth!

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Article by:

Dieter L. Editor of useNature Gold Coast - Brisbane

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Disclaimer:
The information provided in this article is intended for general use and for personal interest only. It should not be used or understood as suggestion or medical advice.