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Calories That Count |
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(READING TIPS: For fast reading, scan through the topic headings in BOLD BLACK, important conclusions in BOLD BLUE, and " Must Know " in BOLD RED. To jump to specific sections in this article, click on the respective LINKS in the Contents.)
| Before You Begin Information presented here is for general educational purposes only. Each one of us is biochemically and metabolically different. If you have a specific health concern and wish my personalized nutritional recommendation, write to me by clicking here. |
Contents
Introduction
Calorie Restriction vs. Malnutrition
Mechanism of Action
History of Calorie Restriction
Animal Application
Human Application
Regular vs. Calorie Restriction
Diet
Mediterranean Diet
Anti-Aging Diet Pyramid
Do You Need Calorie Restriction?
Target Anti-Aging Weight
How
To Calculate Your Ideal Body Weight and Target Anti-Aging Weight
How Many Calories Do I Need To Lose?
Designing An Anti-Aging Diet Plan
Calorie Restriction Precautions
Take Your Time
What You Need To Know
Introduction
Only a single dietary regimen has ever been conclusively demonstrated
to extend life span and improve the heath of laboratory animals and humans.
It is known as calorie restriction
(CR). Together with exercise, this is as close to the magic bullet
as one can hope for in anti-aging. There are very few, if any, disagreements
among anti-aging experts that calorie restriction can increase longevity.
The
average human consumes 1,500 calories a day. The average American consumes
2,100 calories a day. For most of the population, calorie restriction means taking in about 20-30 percent fewer calories.
For those serious about CR, the restriction can go up to 40%. In other words,
the average-size human on a CR diet might consume 1,500 calories a day,
compared to the 2,100 calories of the typical American. This anti-aging
diet is made up of four or five small meals a day and consists predominantly
of vegetables and fruits. "It requires a psychological profile only one
person in 1,000 has," says Richard Miller, associate director for research
at the University of Michigan Geriatrics Center.
Nevertheless, CR diets are widely practiced by anti-aging experts. The
reasons are clear - the list of the beneficial effects of CR reads like
the packaging on a miracle
cure. Benefits include: Increased average
and maximum life spans and reduction in occurrence of virtually all age-related
diseases, including heart disease, diabetes, autoimmune disease, ocular
degeneration, blood pressure, and cancer. These reductions
range from two-fold to as much as ten-fold. (For example, 50
percent of female control mice of a particular genetic strain develop breast
cancer, but only 5 percent of the same strain developed cancer if on a CR
diet.)
Two caveats - the diets must include plentiful
amounts of vitamins and minerals, and the subjects must be undernourished
without being malnourished.
Calorie Restriction vs.
Malnutrition
Calorie restriction is different from malnutrition,
starving or extended fasting. These practices actually accelerate
the aging process as they create nutritional deficiencies. Calorie restriction, if properly carried out, provides the body with
all the nutrients it needs without overburdening the organs and system functions.
By limiting calorie intake to the level required by the body for optimum
functioning (as measured by the maintenance of lean body mass), that miraculous
machine, your body, will self-regulate. When you eat more food than you
need, the engine of your body goes into overdrive in order to digest the
food and store what you don't need in the form of fat. If you restrict
your food intake to only what you need to maintain a physical and active
lifestyle, your body automatically tones down its basal metabolic rate to
conserve the limited amount of energy it receives. This is your body's mechanism
for survival.
Like an old car, your body's engine needs premium gasoline to prime itself
as you age. If you are not mindful of this and continue to abuse your body
with "non-premium" gasoline and rough outings (like going on an eating binge),
you are causing unnecessary strain to your body's organs. Sooner, rather
than later, your body will break down.
What happens to your body as your calorie intake decreases? First, the
work necessary to digest food decreases. In other words, there is less oxidative
stress. Second, the body's metabolic rate automatically slows and readjusts
itself to match your energy expenditure to that of the intake. This is the
body's way of preserving itself. Third, the slowing down of your organ system
gives your organs more rest and prolongs the life span of each of the organs.
As your organs remain healthy, you live longer.
Malnutrition and starvation are extreme forms of calorie restriction,
which is age accelerating and should be avoided. A car cannot
run without gasoline, and your body needs food to generate energy. During
malnutrition or starvation, your body breaks down your muscles and organ
structures for energy, which is very destructive.
Mechanism of Action
The question of how CR works is still open to debate. The leading hypothesis is that calorie restriction reduces the amount
of oxidative damage to the body. Oxidative damage is the foremost
theory as to what causes the deterioration that comes with age. This concept
is known in anti-aging as the "oxygen paradox." While oxygen is required
for life and cellular fuel, the side effects of oxygen metabolism are detrimental
to our heath. The process takes place in cellular factories called mitochondria,
where energy for our body is produced and by-products called free radicals
are also produced. These free radicals are short-lived but voracious agents
that oxidize and damage tissues. The oxidation that occurs in the human
body is identical to the way in which rust is formed on metal, so it is
not unreasonable to say that we will all eventually "rust to death"
if given the opportunity. The free radicals not only damage the tissue,
but also seem to damage the DNA, genetic material that codes for proteins
required for the body's physiological functions.
CR reduces the amount of fuel available for cells and the amount of oxygen
needed by the mitochondria to convert the existing fuel into energy, and
it makes the existing metabolic process more efficient. With CR, fewer
free radicals are generated, the production of enzymes that neutralize the
free radicals increases, and growth hormone levels increase.
CR's effect of lowering oxidative damage is targeted at critical cells in
organs, such as the brain, heart, nerves, and skeletal muscle cells. All
these tissues depend heavily on mitochondrial energy metabolism to generate
cellular energy, and all these tissues have fairly limited self-repair ability.
In addition to lowering oxidative damage, CR
has been proven to increase endogenous growth hormone release from the pituitary
gland. Raising the growth hormone level is key in deterring the
aging process, as symptoms of aging follows the decline in growth hormones
in our bodies.
CR also stimulates the release of our body's
internal antioxidants, such as super oxide dismutase (S.O.D.). Research
has shown that administration of S.O.D. leads to a reduction of free radicals
and an increase in life span.
A properly carried out CR program will limit
the amount of sugar intake by up to 90 percent. Sugar is a negative fountain
of youth. It accelerates aging and increases the body's cortisol level.
Cortisol is a hormone, but unlike other hormones, it increases with aging.
It is sometimes called the "bad" hormone because its increase is linked
to accelerated aging.
In summary, calorie restriction:
- Increases the ability of the body to repair damaged DNA.
- Decreases oxidative (free radical) damage in the body.
- Increases the levels of certain protective/repair proteins that respond to stress.
- Improves glucose-insulin metabolism by lowering glucose levels in the blood.
- Increases the release of growth hormone from the pituitary gland.
- Increases the production of endogenous antioxidants such as S.O.D.
History of Calorie Restriction
The demonstration that mean and maximum life spans are greatly extended in rodents by a CR diet, was first shown in 1935, by Clive M. McKay at Cornell University. He noticed that the regimen of CR doubled the life span of his lab rats. This observation has been confirmed in dozens of other laboratory test, right up to the present time.
CR's effect on life span has been dramatic in every organism thus far tested, from invertebrates (spiders, worms, etc) to fish and rodents. Primate studies are underway, and one may cautiously presume that it may be a "general" effect, and not simply a rodent phenomenon.
In the one closely monitored human study (inside Biosphere 2 for two years from Sept 1991), CR sharply lowered blood cholesterol (by up to 35 percent), blood sugar and blood insulin (by 15 to 20 percent), blood pressure (20 percent or more), and induced other changes paralleling those seen in CR rodents and (more recently) monkeys.
Animal Application
The maximum life span of humans is about 110 years, and about 39 months for mice. Calorie restriction has extended the 39-month maximum life span of mice to an impressive 56 months, which would correspond proportionally to a 158 year-old human. CR mice stay youthful in appearance, in mental and physical abilities, and show enhanced resistance to disease. These well-established facts are why the CR diet is now one of the principal areas of research in gerontology, and is receiving major emphasis from the National Institute on Aging.
The National Institute on Aging (NIA), in collaboration with Weindruch and his colleagues, is testing the CR proposition on rhesus and squirrel monkeys, assuming that if it works for primates, chances are it would work for humans. They now have some 200 monkeys in the trial, half on CR diet and half eating normally. Even these monkeys are likely to live 30 to 40 years, so the study is a long-term endeavor. But the calorie-restricted monkeys are already showing signs of unnaturally robust health.
Human Application
Primate studies are currently underway and will help answer the question
of CR and longevity in humans. The studies are ongoing in three different
laboratories (University of Maryland, University of Wisconsin, and the National
Institute on Aging). It may be 10 more years before we have unequivocal
results. (Let us not forget that monkeys live a long time.)
In studies conducted over the past 65 years, CR works across the
whole animal kingdom, so there is no reason to believe that it would not
work on humans.
In one interesting and accidental experiment, humans were defaulted to a
CR diet due to a food shortage inside Biosphere 2. It was found quite clearly
that these people showed the same physiological and biochemical changes
seen in CR rodents.
Biosphere 2 is a 3.15-acre space in the United States containing an ecosystem
that is energetically open (sunlight, electric power, and heat) but materially
closed, with air, water, and organic material being recycled. For 2 years
from September 1991, eight subjects (four women and four men) were sealed
inside, living on food crops grown within. Due to an unplanned shortage
of food, their diet became low in calories (averaging 1780 kcal/day), low
in fat (10% of calories), and nutrient-dense. This ratio conforms to that
which in numerous animal experiments has promoted health, retarded aging,
and extended maximum life span.
After 6 months inside the Biosphere, the subjects' weight dropped from 74
to 62 kg (men) and from 61 to 54 kg (women). Mean systolic/diastolic blood
pressure dropped from 109/74 to 89/58 mmHg. Total serum cholesterol dropped
from 191 to 123 mg/dl; high density lipoprotein dropped from 62 to 38 (risk
ratio unchanged); triglyceride levels dropped from 139 to 96 mg/dl (men)
and from 78 to 114 mg/dl (women); and fasting glucose dropped from 92 to
74 mg/dl.
There is very little doubt that the drastic reductions in cholesterol and
blood pressure may be instituted in normal individuals in Western countries
by application of a carefully chosen diet. It is also relevant that a low-calorie,
nutrient-dense regimen results in physiological changes in humans similar
to those in other animal species.
Existing long-term data on humans is thin. Most human populations that are
forced to survive on low-calorie diets are also malnourished and are as
likely not to die prematurely from vitamin and mineral deficiencies. The
only known exception is on the Japanese island of Okinawa. The Okinawans have about 70 percent of the calorie intake of the
rest of Japan. They eat mainly fish and vegetables. In Okinawa, up
to 40 times more people, aged over 100, than the rest of Japan. They also
have less incidences of diabetes, tumors, and other diseases than the rest
of Japan.
Regular vs. Calorie Restriction Diet
The typical American consumes 2 pounds of food a day. This equates to 700
pounds a year and about 230 tons of food over a lifetime. The typical meal
consists of 1,200 calorie, of which 43% is fat, 11% is protein, and 46%
is carbohydrate.
The CR diet closely resembles the Mediterranean diet and consists of
750 calories per meal, with 20% calories from fat, 20% from protein, and
60% from complex carbohydrates, such as fruits and vegetables.
Mediterranean Diet
The famous Mediterranean diet is a cuisine that is rich in fruits, vegetables,
grains, omega-3 fatty acids and low in saturated fat. It is a very good
model for an anti-aging diet. This diet has been clinically proven to reduce
the risk of heart disease, and is definitely beneficial for cancer prevention.
The Mediterranean diet is long meals, not fast food. It is fresh, not frozen.
It is a diet high in fiber, antioxidants and other important nutrients.
It is about sharing meals with family and friends, taking time, taking pleasure,
and making every meal a healthy celebration.
Let's look at the characteristics and principles of the Mediterranean Diet:
- The core of the diet consists of an abundance of food from plant sources, including fruits, vegetables, potatoes, bread, grains, beans, nuts and seeds. Food from animal sources is more peripheral. A diet based on this pattern is likely to be sufficient in all essential nutrients necessary to maintain health. Place food from plant sources, rather than animal sources, in the center of your plate.
In the traditional Mediterranean diet, fruits and vegetables were mostly locally grown or gathered, seasonally fresh, and often consumed raw or minimally processed. This kind of lifestyle is also important to incorporate into the Anti-Aging diet, for health promoting benefits. Therefore, use minimally processed and unrefined foods only. That means lots of salads as well as lightly cooked vegetables; fruit as fruit rather than juices; grains as whole grains - like oats, or whole wheat bread or brown rice - rather than white refined flour and puffy processed sugar coated cereals, or white rice. These whole foods will provide plenty of dietary fiber, antioxidants and other micronutrients that are destroyed by heat and removed by the refining processes.
Keep sugar to a minimum. Special care should be taken to minimize the intake of sugar hidden in processed foods under names such as glucose, sucrose, dextrose, high fructose corn syrup, malt syrup, as well as sugar. Sugar provides calories, and calories only. There are no nutrients to speak of at all, which is why sugar (and alcohol for that matter) is called an "empty-calorie" food - empty, that is of any vitamins or minerals, or phytonutrients.Sugar
is a negative fountain of youth. Reduction of sugar in the diet will reduce
cortisol (the "bad" hormone) levels in your body. Cortisol is a hormone
that accelerates the aging process. If you eat desserts, try to consume
them at lunch as you should allow at least 2 to 3 hours after taking sugar
before sleeping. Sugar increases cortisol release, which in turn reduces
growth hormone release, which is most prominent during the early stages
of sleep. Sugar has also been shown to promote free radical formation. Reduction
of sugar intake will reduce the amount of free radicals in the body. Triglyceride
and LDL cholesterol (the "bad" cholesterol) have been shown to decrease
with reduced sugar intake. Lastly, note that cancer cells prefer an environment
rich in sugar, as glucose is the preferred energy source for cancer cells.
Soaking your cells in a high sugar environment promotes cancer growth.
Finally, sugar attaches itself to proteins in the body, becoming cross-linked
into yellow-brown compounds and forming a new sugar-protein substance called
advanced glycation end-product (AGE). The higher the AGE levels, the
faster you age. This has been well documented among diabetics, who have
higher levels of AGE and incidences of artery, nerve, and multiple organ
dysfunction compared to the general population.
- Dairy products are consumed in low to moderate
amounts. They are usually in the form of cheese and yogurt, principally
coming from a variety of animals such as goats, sheep, water buffalo,
cows and camels.
- Fish and poultry should be kept to a low to moderate
weekly consumption. Recent research suggests that fish is more favored
than poultry.
- Red meat should only be taken a few times per month
(consumption should be limited to a total maximum of 12 to 16 ounces
per month, with lean versions preferable).
- Fresh fruit is the typical daily dessert. Sweets
and saturated fat desserts should not be consumed more than a few times
a week, if even that often. Total fats should represent less than 25 to
30 percent of energy with saturated fat comprising no more than 7 to 8
percent of energy (calories).
- Olive oil, the major source of fat in the Mediterranean
diet, is high in mono-unsaturated fat, which is a good source of anti-oxidants.
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Anti-Aging Diet Pyramid
Based on the Mediterranean Diet
model, we have created the Anti-Aging Diet Pyramid. This Diet consists of
50 to 55 percent complex carbohydrates of the paleocarb type ( seeds, legumes,
above ground green leafy vegetables) 20 to 25 percent protein
(preferably from plant , fish, and egg), 25 to 30 percent fat, and 5 percent
sweets, candies and dessert. This is in sharp contrast to the typical North
American diet in which 46 percent of the calories are from carbohydrates,
11 percent from protein and 43 percent from fat. Noticeably absent
from complex carbohydrate are vegetables that grown below the ground such
as potato, yam , or cannot and grains such as bread and rice.
Imagine a pyramid with 4 layers, each layer getting much narrower as it
gets closer to the tip. The broad base layer of the pyramid, that holds
the complex carbohydrates, supplies up to 55 percent of the calories and
consists of a combination of cereals, fruits, vegetables,
and legumes. A limited amount of nuts, which is a fatty food, is also included
in this base layer as well as grains. The second, much smaller layer contains
protein from cheese, egg, fish, poultry or meat. The third layer, which
is very tiny, contains fat from fish, poultry or cooking oil. The final
layer, at the tip, consists of sweets.
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Do You Need Calorie Restriction?
Do you need to be on a calorie
restriction program? The answer depends largely on your current body weight
and composition. Let us take a closer look at how you can determine if you
would benefit from this program. First, some basic understanding of terminology
is required.
There are two methods of determining if you are overweight or
underweight:
1. Ideal Body Weight
2. Target Anti-Aging Weight
The ideal body weight is a statistical average that assumes that you are
an average American in your mid-twenties. The average American is an imaginary
person that does not exist. Whether you are average or not is unimportant.
The important thing to remember is that you are unique and that the ideal
body weight is merely a statistical tool to give you some general guidance
on how much you should weigh. If you have a special build or medical
condition, then you should go by other criteria, including your feelings,
instead of blindly following a statistical number.
Target Anti-Aging Weight
The Target Anti-Aging Weight is the weight you want to achieve to obtain
maximum longevity benefits. There is no hard and fast rule on what this
should be at this time. From many studies, where calorie restrictions of
30 to 40 percent were carried out in laboratory animals, longevity commonly
increased by up to 100 percent. Most researchers, in the anti-aging field, find
a 5 to 10 percent reduction, from the ideal body weight, a prudent and conservative
approach to longevity.
How
To Calculate Your Ideal Body Weight and Target Anti-Aging Weight
If you are a female, your ideal body weight is equal to 100 pounds plus
5 pounds for each inch over five feet. If you are five feet five inches
tall, for example, your ideal body weight is 125 lbs. Add a couple of pounds
if you have a large frame (if your thumb and middle finger encircled around
the opposite wrist do not touch) and subtract a couple of pounds if you
have a small frame (the thumb and middle finger overlap your opposite wrist).
To calculate your target anti-aging weight, subtract 5 to 10 percent
from this ideal weight. Continuing with the above example, your
target anti-aging weight is 104 to 110 pounds.
If you are a male, your ideal body weight is equal to 106 pounds plus 6
pounds for each inch you are over five feet. If you are five feet 10 inches
tall, for example, your ideal body weight is 166 lbs. Add three to five
pounds if you are large frame and subtract a couple of pounds if you have
a small frame.
To calculate your target anti-aging weight, subtract 5 to 10 percent from
the ideal weight. Continuing with the above example, your target anti-aging
weight is 157 to 149 pounds.
How Many Calories Do I Need To Lose?
If you don't make any changes to your current
diet, you are going to slowly increase your weight, assuming that your lifestyle
does not change and your current caloric input and output are balanced.
This is because your base metabolic rate slows down with age. You need less
fuel, so the extra energy gets stored as fat.
If you want to lose weight, you will need
to get rid of 3300 calories for every pound of excess weight you are now
carrying. If you are like most people, you are at least 15 pounds
above your ideal body weight. Losing one pound per week (the recommended,
safe, and effective rate) would take you 15 weeks to lose your excess. Allow
yourself a few extra weeks, just in case, to allow for down times when weight
loss plateaus.
Anti-Aging Approach To Weight Reduction
There are only two ways that can help you
lose weight and keep it off. They are exercise (2,000 calorie expenditure
per week) and calorie restriction.
If you are consuming about 2,000 to 2,500 calories a day, going on a 20
percent calorie restriction program 5 days a week would save you about 500
calories a day (2,500 calories a week). Add to this an exercise program
to burn 1,000 calories a week (3 workouts at 300 calories per workout).
In total, you would lose about 3500 calories a week, which is equivalent
to 1 pound per week. To put it simply, all you have to do, to lose 1 pound a week (which is
the maximum rate of loss recommended), is eat 20 percent less 5 days a week
and do aerobic exercises about 30 minutes 3 times a week.
If you are 12 pounds away from your target; budget 12 weeks to get there.
Add 3 weeks in case your schedule is disrupted. Total time budgeted is,
therefore, 15 weeks. Don't forget that it has taken you many years
to gradually put on the weight. Be patient. Losing weight slowly,
over a 1 to 2 year period, is not uncommon. Most quick-fix diets do not
work and result in a rebound effect.
Once you reach your target weight, you will need around 1,500 to 2,500 calories
to maintain your weight, depending on your level of activity.
Designing An Anti-Aging Diet
Plan
Planning an effective anti-aging diet is not difficult. For each meal, do
the following:
- Pick one serving (2 oz) from any one of the following
protein sources:
- Chicken breast, turkey breast, swordfish, RED roughy, salmon, tuna, crab, lobster, egg white or substitute, low-fat cottage cheese, legumes, nuts and /or tofu.
- Pick one serving (1 cup) from any one of the following
suggested carbohydrate sources:
- Baked potato, sweet potato, yam, squash, steamed
brown rice, pasta, oatmeal, beans, corn, and whole grain bread or
pita.
- Baked potato, sweet potato, yam, squash, steamed
brown rice, pasta, oatmeal, beans, corn, and whole grain bread or
pita.
- Pick two servings (2 cups) from any of the following
vegetables (or any others of your choice):
- Broccoli, asparagus, lettuce, carrots, cauliflower,
green beans, green peppers, mushrooms, spinach, tomato, peas, Brussels
sprouts, cabbage, celery, zucchini, cucumber, onion.
- Broccoli, asparagus, lettuce, carrots, cauliflower,
green beans, green peppers, mushrooms, spinach, tomato, peas, Brussels
sprouts, cabbage, celery, zucchini, cucumber, onion.
- For desserts, pick one to two servings from any
of the following fruits (or any others of your choice):
- Apple, pear, apricot, strawberries, cantaloupe,
peach, watermelon, banana, mango, RED, grapefruit, grapes, cherries,
and many more.
- Apple, pear, apricot, strawberries, cantaloupe,
peach, watermelon, banana, mango, RED, grapefruit, grapes, cherries,
and many more.
This will give you a general idea of what an anti-aging meal should look like. You should have plenty of greens on your plate. At the end of the meal, you will probably only be 70 percent full, but you should feel light and ready for a leisurely walk.
| Questions? Ask me. |
Calorie Restriction Precautions
Now that you know calorie restriction is an important component of an anti-aging program, it is equally important to address the pitfalls of such a program.
With CR, the quality of the diet must be increased so that essential nutrients like vitamins, minerals, and amino acids are not reduced. The reason the semi-starved populations in parts of Africa or the Orient don't live longer is that they are not just calorie restricted, they are also malnourished. The "adequate nutrition" side of CR is essential; (given that, there is a proportional relationship between fewer calories, longer life, and benefits down to about a 50 percent restriction in rodents). In other words, CR is not an all or none phenomenon. Even a 10 percent reduction in calories has a measurable beneficial effect. Of course, there is a lower limit. Anything below a 50 percent reduction takes you into actual calorie starvation, and the death rate increases. A fifty percent restriction is not recommended for humans. That's far too close to not having enough calories!
To avoid malnutrition (which shortens life span), it is critical that anyone who is on CR consider supplementing with optimal level of nutritional factors to ensure adequate nutrition at the same time boosting the level of antioxidants in the body.
Key nutrients like 400 IU of vitamin E and 50 mcg of chromium are needed for optimum functions. To get these amounts however, would require a 5,000-calorie diet. It's a catch twenty-two. 5,000 calories a day leads to excess weight, but anything less provides nutrients that do not meet anti-aging levels. That's where nutritional supplementation comes in. Taking nutritional supplements allows you to participate in a calorie restriction program and still get an optimum level of nutrients including the much-needed antioxidants.
Scientists have now been able to demonstrate that high intakes of antioxidants significantly increase life span. Researchers have found that drugs that mimic some natural antioxidants are able to extend the life span of worms (Caenorhabditis elegans) by nearly 50%. They hope that the synthetic antioxidants will someday be able to boost or enhance the human body's responses to oxidative stresses as well, and could possibly prolong human life and help to slow or reverse age-related degenerative conditions.
In laboratory tests, antioxidants also restored normal life spans to a subgroup of nematodes that would otherwise have aged and died prematurely due to a genetic defect linked to oxidative stress. "These results suggest that endogenous oxidative stress is a major determinant of the rate of aging," wrote Simon Melov, PhD, and colleagues from the Buck Institute for Age Research in Novato, California, the United Kingdom's University of Manchester, and Atlanta's Emory University.
Common and more well known antioxidants, such as vitamins C and E, work by interrupting chain reactions, that would otherwise result in the oxidation of cells, caused by a release of substances from cell membranes. "Antioxidants like vitamin E are called chain-breaking antioxidants, because they react with one of the species that's going to propagate and stop the chain reaction. So instead of a process that might involve a hundred molecules, if you have vitamin E around, it might stop after only five; so it inhibits oxidation by breaking the chain, preventing the propagation of chain reactions," noted Dr. Irwin Fridovich, PhD, professor of biochemistry at Duke University.
Optimal anti-aging supplementation should include:
- Vitamin A (in the form
of beta carotene): 20,000 - 25,000 I.U.
- Vitamin C: 1,000 mg - 3,000
mg
- Vitamin E: 400 I.U
- Selenium: 200 mcg
- Chromium: 100 - 200 mcg
- Magnesium: 500 mg
- Calcium: 500 - 1,500 mg
- Ascobyl Palmitate (fat-soluble
form of Vitamin C): 100 - 200 mg
- L-Proline: 100 - 200 mg
- L-Lysine: 100 - 200 mg
- L-Glutamine: 500 - 2,000 mg
Take Your Time
Dietary habits are formed over a lifetime. Give
yourself 1 to 2 years to be completely comfortable with the Anti-Aging Diet.
Change your overall habits a little at a time. Be happy with the progress
and be proud of making the change. Start by following the anti-aging diet
plan for 1 meal a day, especially if you are not used to eating lots of
vegetables. Gradually, move to 3 anti-aging meals a day for 1 day a week,
increasing the number of meals as tolerated. Reward yourself with a slight
indulgence once a week or so, at which time; you should not feel guilty
for eating whatever you like.
What You Need To Know
Calorie
restriction extends life span and is a proven anti-aging tool. There is
no doubt about it. Follow the Mediterranean diet in terms of what you
should eat. A simple rule to remember is the
30/60/90 rule: reduce your calories by 30%, increase vegetable intake to
60%, and reduce your sugar intake by 90%. To avoid malnutrition, take your
optimal dosages of your food-based supplements.
| Message from Dr. Lam I hope you have enjoyed reading this article. If you have areas you don’t understand, comments (good or bad), or if you have a specific health concern, feel free to write to me by clicking here. |
About The Author
Michael Lam, M.D., M.P.H., A.B.A.A.M. is a specialist in Preventive and Anti-Aging Medicine. He is currently the Director of Medical Education at the Academy of Anti-Aging Research, U.S.A. He received his Bachelor of Science degree from Oregon State University, and his Doctor of Medicine degree from Loma Linda University School of Medicine, California. He also holds a Masters of Public Health degree and is Board Certification in Anti-aging Medicine by the American Board of Anti-Aging Medicine. Dr. Lam pioneered the formulation of the three clinical phases of aging as well as the concept of diagnosis and treatment of sub-clinical age related degenerative diseases to deter the aging process. Dr. Lam has been published extensively in this field. He is the author of The Five Proven Secrets to Longevity (available on-line). He also serves as editor of the Journal of Anti-Aging Research.
For More Information
For the latest anti-aging related health issues, visit Dr. Lam
at www.LamMD.com. Feel free to email
Dr. Lam at dr@LamMD.com if you have any questions.
Reprint Information
This article may, in its unabridged, unaltered form and in its entirety only,
be reprinted and republished without permission provided that it is for personal
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clearly displayed as source. Written permission from Dr. Lam is required
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© 1999 Michael Lam, M.D. All Rights Reserved.
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Murry M: Encyclopedia of Natural Medicine. Prima Health Publishing, 1998.
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Sinatra S: Optimum Health. Batam Books, New York, 1997.
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