Think About It, Will You?

Your brain is a powerful, powerful thing.  It thinks, reacts, considers, remembers, judges, determines, solves, computes, as well as a host of other things.  It's the reason you're breathing, walking, lifting that heavy weight, and of course eating that healthy meal.  But did you know that as you age, your brain tends to shrink?  It actually decreases in volume and cognitive ability!  Yikes!  It's an inevitability, but the good news is that you can easily give yourself a fighting chance in your golden years if you just consider your health a little more thoroughly.  

Did you know that being obese is actually dangerous to your brain?  That's right!  Not only are you straining your heart, muscles, liver, kidneys, bones, and ligaments, but also that organ which keeps you thinking clearly.  Research has proven that obese people have smaller brains than people of "normal" weight.  YEAH!  THEY'RE ACTUALLY SMALLER!  Crazy, eh?  Believe me, a smaller volume of brain cells in critical areas is not something you want.  It will affect your ability to problem solve, remember, and in general think clearly.  This problem only gets worse as you get older, and in your golden years, size does matter.  You want as BIG a brain as possible, with the most possible ability to think and remember clearly.  The bigger the effective volume of your brain, the lesser chance of getting cognitive diseases such as Alzheimer's.  Lose that spare tire, and gain some of that witty spark back!

And this preservation of your brain comes with another little fun twist.  It's been shown that people with greater muscle mass, in general, retain greater cognitive function as they age!  WOW!  Those gym trips aren't just giving you the guns after all!  It turns out that a healthy amount of muscle mass will preserve a greater flow of blood through your cerebral passages, leading to...you guessed it...more thinking power!  Less muscle= poor cerebral blood flow = brain damage/deterioration throughout your life. 

Lifting those weights also helps to build NEW blood passages throughout your brain, which will allow nutrients to penetrate deeper into critical brain tissue, actually encouraging "neurogenesis" or the creation of new brain cells!  Remember way back when, when you heard all those people tell you that brain cells can't regenerate, and what you have is what you've got, no matter what?  Well that's a bunch of hooey!  Your brain is constantly remodeling and adapting to your current life situation.  Once it stops, you're in trouble.  Support neurogenesis through exercise and healthy diet, and you'll keep better brain function as you age.  

So what's the final word?  Lose that spare tire, and hit the gym a few more times each week.  You'll not only get that beach body, but you'll be quite the sharp thinker for a long time to come.  

Good Luck!

References:  Braverman, Eric R., and Dale Kiefer. "Combating Age-Related Brain Deterioration."Life Extension Oct. 2011. Print.

Chew Gum, Stay on Track

Even as I type this, I'm already chewing a piece of gum.  I'll be honest, I love the stuff, and I'm not alone.  Thousands of people chew gum for different reasons, whether it be to freshen their breath, cure temporary boredom, work out the jaw, or even help them stay on their diet.  Gum is a great tool in many regards, and if you don't already chew it on a regular basis, I hope this article might help you to take advantage of some of the benefits gum can offer.

First of all, before I say anything else, I recommend SUGAR FREE GUM.  This is the stuff you want, not its sugar packed cousin.  Sugared gum will have quite a few more calories and will most likely spike your insulin unnecessarily, kicking your diet off track little by little.  Sugar free gum only has sugar alcohol, which is only partially digested, so the calories are next to naught.  There are between 3.5 and 5 calories in sugar free gum, depending on whether you get the longer flatter pieces, or the shorter, more compact, thicker pieces.  Just check out the nutrition label on the back of the package.

So what are some of gum's most awesome benefits?  Let's examine a few, shall we?

Curbs Appetite:  Yes that's right, gum might keep you from overeating.  Because the action neccessary to chew gum so closely resembles consuming food, you may be able to trick your body into thinking it's actually receiving food when you're actually not!  Neat!

But don't go overboard on this nifty little fact.  Gum won't keep you full, and generally the effect will wear off or even reverse after a certain amount of time, because your stomach keeps expecting food it's not getting.  Gum should never be used as a meal replacement, or even a snack replacement.  It should be used as temporary tool to curb any existing hunger after you've known you already ate enough, or wish to take the edge off before a meal.  Simple things like that.  It doesn't work miracles, but it can definitely help you stay on track.  For example, it's said that gum chewers consume up to 10% less than non-gum chewers.  Not a bad figure, especially for such a simple solution.

Decreases Anxiety:  I bet you've noticed this effect before, as I certainly have.  Gum can help calm your nerves, as it focuses the mind elsewhere and gets rid of a little pent up, tension related energy.  This effect, in the long run, can end up helping you eat less, because anxiety is a HUGE culprit of binge eating.  If you're a little nervous, a simple stick of gum might do wonders for you.

Oral Health:  OK, I'm not going to say that chewing gum is a replacement for brushing your teeth, so don't get too excited.  But studies have show that chewing sugar-free gum can both directly and indirectly decrease the effect of plaque on your teeth.  Direct effects may include the actual removal of harmful food matter off of your teeth, and indirect effects include the stimulation of salivary glands which will help to fight the effects of plaque after a meal.  So pick up a stick of gum after dinner and you might impress your dentist a little more come your next appointment! (Though they always seems to complain anyway, don't they?)

Cognitive Performance:  Amazingly, gum can help your mind perform more sharply and efficiently.  There have been all sorts of studies done on gum and its effects on the brain, and many have shown that chewing gum can help test/school performance as a whole.  In fact, this article describes one of the studies quite well:

It turns out there’s an excellent rationale for this long-standing cultural habit: Gum is an effective booster of mental performance, conferring all sorts of benefits without any side effects. The latest investigation of gum chewing comes from a team of psychologists at St. Lawrence University. The experiment went like this: 159 students were given a battery of demanding cognitive tasks, such as repeating random numbers backward and solving difficult logic puzzles. Half of the subjects chewed gum (sugar-free and sugar-added) while the other half were given nothing. Here’s where things get peculiar: Those randomly assigned to the gum-chewing condition significantly outperformed those in the control condition on five out of six tests. (The one exception was verbal fluency, in which subjects were asked to name as many words as possible from a given category, such as “animals.”) The sugar content of the gum had no effect on test performance.

That's pretty remarkable if I don't say so myself.  Although I bet you're asking why this effect occurs.  This article goes on to state that this temporary sharpening of the mind (yes it's temporary, in the same article it said effects were only noticeable for about 20 minutes) is due to "mastication-induced arousal."  Now don't read that phrase out loud, as it will probably cause you to burst out laughing, but it basically means that chewing something wakes you up and causes you to be more alert.  It's a pretty simple concept, yet definitely one worth noting.

Chewing gum can definitely be an advantageous activity, and the great news is that it's probably one you already enjoy.  So chew with confidence, as you know you're doing your body a bit of good!

Remember, sugar-free.  Good Luck!


A few References:

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/11/the-cognitive-benefits-of-chewing-gum/

http://www.wrigleydentalcare.com/orbit_us/media-area/articles/the-oral-health-advantages-of-chewing-sugarfree-gum/index.htm