Alkaline Diet

Anti Aging Diet and Nutrition – a Journey to the Fountain of Youth

Posted on 20. Oct, 2010 by Staff Writer Candy Del Carmen in Blog

How interesting to read topics pertaining to the proverbial magical fountain of youth. Who would not want to be forever young looking, not just forever young at heart? The magical elixir of life is promising to offer people an energetic life, free from chronic diseases and live a longer life than to their life expectancy. Where is the fountain of youth? Basically, it is nowhere to be found but it is something you have to achieve – a healthy lifestyle. Yes, a healthy approach to health makes everyone younger looking. This is not a myth, a secret or just hearsay. To give you the more concrete, research based and proven facts, this piece of writing will bring you necessary information regarding the nutrients we need for anti-aging.

What causes premature aging?

Several factors can be contributed to accelerate aging and one of the most aspects to consider is the nutrition. As we all know, there are two effects we can expect from our daily nutrition: either it may defy the aging process or accelerate it. In endless researches searching for the answer what causes aging process, the free radicals are found to be responsible for premature aging as it cause the blood clotting in our blood vessels and tremendously destroy these anti-clot hormones among healthy arteries which lead to the development of cognitive diseases, arthritis, emphysema, cardiovascular disorders, and many underlying conditions of aging.

Anti-aging nutrients

If we would sum up what nutritional substances we fundamentally need for anti-aging, here are the lists: necessary enzymes, vitamins, minerals, essential fatty acids, herbs, and amino acids. To make it simpler, you can keep in mind that any antioxidant may reverse the aging process. This is no longer an alien to our awareness how antioxidant and free radicals are always linked to each other.

Among all these life-extending nutrients, very common that medical literature associated antioxidants in neutralizing free radicals or the chemically-reactive molecules. The reason behind this is that free radicals are damaging the cell membranes resulting to premature aging, degenerative diseases, and eventually, the unfortunate death of our cells. Our body’s own defense can definitely neutralize the free radicals as we have our antioxidants that counteract these damaging molecules inhabiting within our cells, tissues, and bloodstream.

Antioxidants can be found in any food with vitamin A, , vitamin C, vitamin E,  carotene family (lycopene, beta carotene, lutein, zenanthin, etc.), and trace minerals,. Others take pleasure to get antioxidants in form of supplements, while some are spending money to inject the useful age-defying formula to boost their supply for antioxidant. Nevertheless, the best and safest approach is to consume this beneficial antioxidant in the form of foods packed with nutritional value.

Carotenoids Family

The distinctive pigments of vegetables with carotenoids are the phytonutrients that make the fruits and vegetables appear in different colors such as red, orange and yellow pigments. Carotenoids strengthen our immune system and reduce the risk of stroke, heart attack, and cancer. The number of benefits cannot be completed if we do not mention that carotenoid can also lower the chances to develop a cataracts and ARMD or age-related macular degeneration. In late 20^th century, caretonoids family are now called provitamin A compounds as our body is able to convert the 50 carotenoids of among 600 known carotenoids into retinol, an active form found in vitamin A.

Great sources of carotene are tomatoes, sweet potatoes, kale, carrots, spinach, winter squash, turnip greens, cilantro, and fresh thyme.

Vitamin C

One of the most powerful antioxidant that has been proven in many clinical researches is no other than vitamin C. The super vitamin which acts as antiviral and has the power to prevent wide variety of illnesses from simple colds and flu to cataracts and hypertension.

Citrus fruits such as lemons, limes, oranges, tangerines, and grapefruits are rich in vitamin C.

Vitamin E

Most taken and well-known antioxidant is vitamin E which helps to prevent arteries from clogging leading to cardiovascular diseases and allows blood circulation through arteries even if there are plaques present. There was a study conducted to postmenopausal women and the result found that intake of vitamin E can certainly reduce the risk of death from massive stroke caused by heart attack. Likewise, for men with history of stroke and who were prescribed to take aspirin, a study found that regular intake of vitamin E together with aspirin can drastically reduce the build up of plaque around vessel walls and therefore decrease the risk of another stroke.

Food sources rich in vitamin E are almonds, pistachio nuts, mixed peanuts, safflower oil, turnip greens, raw mango, broccoli, dandelion greens, and kiwi. Vitamin E is also widely available in capsules that can be purchased to wide variety of vitamin stores.

Proanthocyanadins

Another antioxidant compound which derived from vegetables and plants are the proanthocyanadins that is responsible to avert the blockage of bad cholesterol and reduce the amount of total cholesterol. There was a study conducted to European and French who are traditionally indulge in large amounts of fatty foods, yet, also consume large amounts of proanthocyanadins commonly found in vegetables, fruits, and red wine. As the result, there is very low incidence of cardiovascular disease as attributed to cardio-protective benefits of this antioxidant. Think of any healthy purple and red in your diet if you would like to get the right amount of proanthocyanadins such as apples, blueberries, blackberries, cranberries, plums, black currants, and bilberries.

Selenium

Among the trace minerals, selenium helps the body to prevent immune dysfunction. Some researches showed that it can also help reduce the risk of certain cancers. You can fight the free radicals with antioxidant found in selenium which can defend cell membranes from harsh damage. Selenium also addresses the needs to support eyes, nerves, breast tissue, muscles, skin and many more. Vitamin E with selenium capsules is now available in wide market. Fish and meat are natural sources of selenium, but of course, as we all know that flesh meats are acidic foods; we can stick to healthier options of another source of selenium such as healthy nuts.

Herbs

You can find anywhere the herbs that are so promising in our journey looking for the extension of our youthfulness. Ginkgo biloba is one of those, in which its powerful antioxidant can be of equal or with greater importance. To our extremity, ginkgo can stimulate the blood circulation and avoids nerve damage and oxygen deprivation to our body system such as the heart.

Green Foods

Last but not the least; green foods are no less than but the most ideal foods for anti-aging. The health benefits in taking high quality greens are undisputed not only that these foods are boosting the immune system, improving mental focus and clarity, increasing energy level, improving digestion, softening skin, stabilizing blood sugar, detoxifying heavy metals and toxins accumulated, and rebuilding nerve damage in the brain and nervous system.

Barley, grass, spirulina, chlorella, and green tea are praised for these and are packed with life-extending essential nutrients like countless vitamins, minerals, amino acids, and enzymes crucial for long life.

Alkaline Diet Can Reverse Aging

No doubt that consuming large amount of vegetables and fruits can truly reverse the aging process. High alkaline diet (green leafy vegetables, lemons, healthy seeds and nuts, etc.) is labeled as “anti-aging” as it increases our daily intake of antioxidants. Acidosis from acidic foods such as meat, dairy products, sweets, etc. are merely leading to cell damage and the direct relationship of alkaline diet toward optimum health is an irrefutable fact. If you suffer from the symptoms of overweight, joint pain, osteoporosis, high blood pressure, and many underlying conditions of acidosis, you cannot certainly call yourself as young.

According to Mr. Sang Whang, a successful scientist and writer of a book titled Reverse Aging, he explained that for us to get younger, we have to profoundly understand the phenomenon relationship of alkaline diet and anti-aging. Protection of healthy cells from free radicals can simply achieve if we can neutralize the accumulation of acid waste products inside our body which causes the aging. He explain the two steps in doing this: first step is to have good digestion to properly eliminate waste products, and second is to find a way to pull out some of these old wastes trying to hide inside our body system.

If we carefully analyze the two steps for anti-aging, it will all boil down to our daily nutrition that our body needed in order for us to properly eliminate these toxic and acidic waste products. Therefore, the fountain of youth can really find no where but it really lies to your lifestyle. It is never too late for us to not surrender our journey toward our ultimate goal – to reverse aging process and to live a long and healthy life. Nevertheless, it is our journey, which is our chosen lifestyle that really matters in the end.

Tags: anti aging, anti aging diet, how to look younger