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Monday 23 November 2009

okayyyyy, here I go.....one small step.....

Food Facts:
The book 'The Gene Smart Diet" I am skimming it now for any pearls of wisdom to absorb.

"Eat less, lose weight, and you'll have less inflammation and fewer biomarkers of aging. Eat more and the opposite occurs" exploring the health choice of calorie restriction. (CR-- calorie restriction) Not Fasting.
CR dramatically reduces c-reactive protein, a biomarker of of inflammation, in humans.
Pros and Cons of Calorie Restriction:
Pros--lowers blood pressure, lovers bad (LDL) cholesterol, lowers triglycerides--raises good (HDL) cholesterol---lowers fasting insulin and glucose levels--- lowers C-reactive protein--slows DNA damage.
Cons---only one-- being hungry---most peoples stomachs are larger and can accommodate more food due to the size of food portions ingested being ever increasing.
Solution----Eat something at least every 2 hours, you will never be hungry and your brain will stop sending signals and your stomach will stop expanding and expecting larger portions.

Mar"s tips: I aways have Walnuts, Almonds, and Dried fruits(careful with these that they don't have added oils or sweeteners, even concentrated apple/grape juice added will increase the empty calories) and a small container of whole grain cereal.
Food choices are so important, make everything you eat count. Save your empty calories for alcohol.

As for moi---my reading choices, reference above gene smart health, are involved. I use reading as a therapy tool. The more complex, the more focus it requires, concentration is difficult to access when my brain chemicals are doing their funky thang.
I have been housebound due to illness, and now torrential rains and biblical flooding. Thanks to the Universe my area has not flooded, only dealing with really dark grey skies and rain, rain rain.
I am doing my light Therapy again, when sick with the pneumonia I actually forgot about it, because spent two full weeks in bed and then daily trips to the living room, and I realized as I was trying to watch T.V. and couldn't focus, and was weeping at long distance phone commercials. It came to me, that one reason I was feeling worse than usual was I Had forgotten to do my light therapy.
So the veil of darkness that had so completely engulfed me again, has begun to allow some lightness of being to slowly emerge. Hence today's effort at blogging.
Have done 13 pushups- and got those little sparkly lites in my vision- so will do 10, 3 times a day, and start to build up some physical stamina. And will do a 20 minute walk ummmmm, tomorrow, uhhh , maybe.
Anyhow that's it for moi.

Flipping the switch to Health--The master health regulators.

A central switchboard for controlling the genes that dictate how long yeast cells live, and how many times they divide.
Actually the switchboard is a biological pathway that the scientists called Sir2 (sir stands for silent information regulator).
Simply put Sir2 senses how many nutrients are available to an organism in its environment. If nutrients are scarce--as they are when we restrict calories--the switchboard lights up and its activity increases. This activity, in turn, has a major impact on how long an organism lives and/or how many times it can reproduce. For the yeast cells, activating the switchboard extended their life span by a whopping 30 to 40%, just like calorie restriction.
"By reducing inflammation, which leads to better cell maintenance, the sirtuins increase life span and overall health."
The entire family of protein switchboards is collectively known as Sirtuins.
It is thought that all seven sirtuins (SIRTs 1 thru 7) deploy in response to the calorie restriction, they sense when the body is running low on nutrients and direct a wide range of metabolic adjustments. So if calorie restriction continues on an extended period, the body gradually reaches a new equilibrium.
For instance---insulin sensitivity improves-- a great thing when you consider that insulin resistance is a step on the path toward diabetes. Oxygen consumption and physical activity increase, and energy use returns to pre-CR levels.
CR provides a turbo boost, too: in animals, we see a marked enhancement of their ability to endure a number of other stressors like heat and alcohol. All of these changes are hallmarks of calorie restriction in mammals.

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