Build and preserve your muscle mass in 8 minutes

The older you get, the more muscle mass you lose and with that come all sorts of problems as you age, including weight gain, diabetes, arthritis but also brain shrinkage.

Improving strength and muscle mass is associated with better function of brain white matter – the areas of the brain responsible for making fast connections between brain areas or between the brain and the body. Other studies have shown that loss of muscle mass is associated with lower brain volume and dementia, and muscle mass was also positively correlated with cognitive function in individuals from the UK Biobank study. There are several potential reasons for this association, one critical factor is that your muscles are the best way to improve blood sugar control, which is critical for reducing the risk of dementia.

However, it is important to realise that you don’t need to train like a bodybuilder! Just four sets per week of resistance training is enough to see benefit!

Literally 5 minutes of exercise, or 8 minutes if you include the gaps between the exercises, is all you need to do three to four times a week to build and preserve muscle mass.

Set yourself the goal of three x 8 minute sessions per week, scheduled in your diary to keep you motivated and on track.

Watch these short videos from ex-Gladiator, Kate Staples for some instruction and motivation to get started:

Kate Staples Burn Fat Fast Videos

https://www.patrickholford.com/kate-staples-burn-fat-fast-videos/

You can also see more on the programme in your library, where the beginner’s, intermediate and advanced programmes are laid out:

https://foodforthebrain.org/library/strength-training-in-8-minutes-with-kate-staples/

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Get moving

Movement is one of the most powerful ways to reduce your future risk cognitive decline. In fact, brisk walking was the first physical activity that was shown to increase the size of the hippocampus – the area of the brain critical for memory and dealing with stress – in older adult humans! In that study, participants who were randomised to walk briskly for 40 min three times per week saw an increase in the size of the hippocampus compared to a control group after a year.

Participants started with the 10 minutes of walking, increased it by 5 minutes every week, and then increased speed as the got more comfortable. In addition to walking, almost any exercise can improve brain health, and one of the ways it does that is through the production of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF). In the walking study, the more a person’s fitness improved, the higher their BDNF was, and the greater the benefit for their brain.

The authors of that study suggest that 40 minutes of aerobic training like brisk walking 3 times per week was enough to reverse many of the effects of aging on the brain. Even 30 minutes three times a week, or 1.5 hours of any exercise that gets your heart rate up – walking, jogging, cycling, swimming, active gardening – counts. What can you do this week?

 

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Improving your physical activity starts today starts today

In the weeks that follow, starting now we’re going to guide you in taking simple steps to improve your physical activity, one step at a time, in a way that literally has the ability to increase your brain size!

There’s a bit of a vicious circle in that, if you don’t do any exercise you lose muscle mass and it’s muscle that burns off sugar so you tend to gain weight which, together with less muscle mass, then makes exercising less easy to do.

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It takes a few weeks to change habits and most of the exercises and suggestions will be new to you. Inevitably you’ll find some that work better for you than others. We encourage you to try them all because there is a combined effect which can help transform you to the point where you gain strength and stamina and have more energy, too.

 

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Your Gut Health domain – how have you progressed?

Congratulations. You’ve finished a month focussing on improving your gut health, restoring a healthy microbiome, increasing your intake of soluble fibre, reducing gut irritants and maybe eliminating some food allergens.

Now is the time to find out how much difference improving your gut health has made to your future brain health. To see how much reduction you’ve achieved in your Dementia Risk Index click the button below to complete only the ‘gut health’ related questions. This will show you, specifically, what level of improvement you’ve made over these past 4 weeks, what effect that has on your ‘gut health’ domain score, and your overall Dementia Risk Index.

You will then be asked to choose the next domain you’d like to focus on for the next 4 weeks. Note: if you got distracted and didn’t make many changes such that ‘gut health’ is still in your top two weakest domains you can choose to focus on this again with more resolve.

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Solving constipation

Popular advice for constipation is to eat more fibre-rich foods such as wholegrains. These are more fad than fact since there is no consistent evidence that fibre works. In fact, in some studies having more fibre makes matters worse, not better.

For example, in a study of 63 adults who suffered from chronic constipation and were on a high fibre diet and/or were taking fibre supplements. Of these, 41 were put on a no-fibre diet, 16 on a reduced fibre diet and 4 remained on their high fibre diet.

Of those put on the no-fibre diet frequency went from once every 3.75 days to once a day. Those on the reduced fibre diet went from once every 4.19 days to very 1.9 days while there was no change in those who stayed on their high fibre diet.

This study is one of quite a few which show no benefit, or worsening on a high fibre diet. A review on studies treating IBS sufferers with high fibre diets shows much the same thing, with an increase in regular ‘insoluble’ fibres found in wholegrain wheat, probably making matters worse not better. Linseed or flax seeds also contains insoluble lignins. Evidence of their benefit in studies of people with IBS is rather thin.

Before you throw the baby out with the bathwater most studies do, however, show a benefit for ‘soluble’ fibres which is what you find in oats and chia seeds. People given soluble fibres in studies were almost twice as likely to report benefit, with increased frequency and ease, than those on placebo. What you want are fibres that absorb the most water, thus bulking up and lightening the contents in the colon. See this film ‘The Truth about Fibre’ here

One way to increase your intake of soluble fibres is to have a tablespoon of chia seeds a day. Another is to eat whole oat products. You can further up your soluble fibre intake by adding a teaspoon of oat bran to cereal. Soluble fibres are also in vegetables, although somewhat destroyed by heat and hence prolonged cooking. They behave quite differently to, for example, wheat fibre.

Natural foods stay soft in the digestive tract because they contain fibres which absorb water and expand inside the digestive tract. Fruits and vegetables naturally contain a lot of water in themselves. Provided they are prepared properly, whole grains, such as oats and rice, absorb water and provide watery bulk for the digestive tract. Given that we are literally 65 per cent water, it makes sense to eat foods with a high water content. Meats, cheese, eggs, refined grains and wheat (because of its gluten content) can all be constipating. While it should not be necessary to add fibre to a good diet, oat fibre has particular benefits. This is naturally present in oats which are best soaked and eaten cold.

The most super-soluble fibre of all is glucomannan fibre, derived from the konjac plant. Glucomannan has been shown to be helpful in a study in China with adults prone to constipation, both increasing frequency and ease by 30% in a week. It has the added advantage of helping to promote weight loss, as shown by numerous studies, the most recent of which reported almost 2.5kg weight loss over 60 days compared to placebo, in volunteers taking 3 grams (a teaspoon or 3 1g capsules) a day.

You want to take in 3 grams a day, which means 3 capsules taken twice a day, or a teaspoon of powder, both always taken with a large glass of water. Increasing your intake of vitamin C may also help keep you regular.

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Solving the riddle of bloating

The three most effective ways to reduce bloating are eliminating food intolerances, gluten-free or modern wheat-free diets, and supplementing digestive enzymes and probiotics. Let’s examine the evidence.

Bloating, IBS and Food Intolerances

Several studies have shown that people with IBS have higher levels of food-specific IgG antibodies in their blood – much more than in “healthy” subjects. Knowing that IBS sufferers have significantly raised levels of IgG antibodies to specific foods, researchers at the University of South Manchester (1) tested 150 IBS sufferers with a YorkTest food specific IgG antibody test and then gave their doctors either the real or fake results. Only those following a diet eliminating their food intolerances had relief from IBS symptoms of bloating and abdominal pain. What’s more, those who stuck to it the most strictly had the best results. Level of compliance, on the other hand, didn’t make a difference in those on the sham diets.

Gluten and Modern vs Ancient Wheat

The most common food linked to bloating is wheat. The increasing prevalence of non-celiac gluten sensitivity is raising questions regarding what people are reacting to and why. A recent Dutch survey of 785 people self-reporting gluten sensitivity found that only two, on testing, had coeliac disease. Symptoms reported included bloating (74%), abdominal discomfort (49%) and flatulence (47%).

A recent trial tested the effects of a gluten-free or placebo diet (giving gluten containing or gluten-free bread) for four weeks on 60 IBS sufferers. There was a strong reduction in bloating and abdominal pain in those on the gluten-free versus placebo diet, and a return of symptoms on reintroducing gluten.

Professor Francesco Sofi, at the University of Florence, had a hunch that it might not be wheat per se, but gluten and other proteins have been changed in modern wheat compared to that of ancient wheat that is driving bloating and IBS. To test this theory he gave IBS sufferers foods (bread, pasta, biscuits) made from either modern wheat or ancient organic Kamut® ‘khorosan’ wheat for six weeks, randomly assigned. This is the same wheat that was eaten thousands of years ago.

During the modern-wheat weeks they had no improvement. However, when they were unknowingly eating Kamut, everything got better. They reported significantly less bloating, abdominal pain, irregularity and tiredness. Remarkably, every single person in the study reported benefit. Also, blood markers of inflammation all reduced by a third.

Digestive Enzymes and Probiotics

Every day the body produces a staggering 9 litres of digestive juices containing enzymes. The most common offending foods for wind are beans, lentils and other pulses, which require alpha-galactosidase for their digestion; and greens, especially cruciferous vegetables (cabbage, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower), which require amyloglucosidase (also called glucoamylase). Certain others generate more gas, including turnips, leeks, onions and garlic. Some people produce insufficient amounts of the enzyme, alpha-galactosidase, or amyloglucosidase, the enzyme that digest greens.

It is not easy, or perhaps necessary, to test if a person is a poor producer of digestive enzymes. The simplest ‘test’ is just to give a person a comprehensive digestive enzyme supplement containing all the above enzymes, plus lactase, amylase, protease and lipase, being the key digestive enzymes.

A product containing both probiotics and inulin was found to help IBS patients. It boosted the numbers of the beneficial bifidobacteria. Symptoms, such as pain and bloating, improved. People with IBS are most often reported to have a low level of bifidobacteria. A study in Finland found that those who reported abdominal pain had five times lower levels of bifidobacteria than those who didn’t have these symptoms. While probiotics have been shown to help IBS in children, adult studies are not consistently positive. Generally, the best results with probiotics are reported in multi strain supplements providing both Lactobacillus Acidophilus and Bifidobacterium.

Also read the Report Solutions for Constipation, Bloating and IBS in your Library.

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What your dental hygiene has to do with dementia

Periodontitis is another word for gum disease, caused by a specific bacteria called Porphyromonas gingivalis, that leads to infection of the tissue holding the teeth in place, and as a consequence, symptoms such as bleeding gums and loose teeth. Having periodontal disease, a consequence of infection and dysbiosis, is associated with a significant increase of cognitive decline with increasing dental visits correlating with Alzheimer’s.

Gingipains destroy brain cells

The bacteria responsible for gum infection is not only found in those with gum disease, but has also been found at low levels in 25% of healthy individuals with no presence of oral disease. However, what more recent studies are showing is that it is the proteins called gingipains, that are released by the bacteria, that are responsible for damage to nerve cells in the brain, rather than just the bacteria on its own. During experiments carried out in mice that were infected orally by P.gingivalis, scientists discovered that they later demonstrated signs of brain deterioration and infection, which are concurrent with humans showing symptoms of early-stage dementia.

In this same study, carried out by researchers from a variety of universities, brain tissue samples from approximately 100 people with and without Alzheimer’s were analysed and tested for two different types of gingipain proteins. They also tested for the presence of gingipain DNA in both the cerebrospinal fluid and the saliva of people that had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. What they found was that the level of gingipains in brain tissue of those with Alzheimer’s was between 91% and 96% (for the two different proteins), in comparison to 39% and 52% in those without Alzheimer’s. Furthermore, they found gingipain DNA in 7 out of 10 cerebrospinal fluid samples in those with Alzheimer’s and 10 out of 10 for the saliva samples.

Researchers from the University of Central Lancashire in the UK, report that bacteria like P.gingivalis can enter from oral cavities into the bloodstream through a variety of daily activities, such as eating, brushing teeth and chewing. However, they mention in a study published in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, that the bacteria is more likely to enter the circulatory system after invasive dental treatment, which then goes on to trigger inflammation. Dr. Sim K. Singhrao, Senior Research Fellow at UCLan said: “we are working on the theory that when the brain is repeatedly exposed to bacteria and/or their debris from our gums, subsequent immune responses may lead to nerve cell death and possibly memory loss.”

How to prevent periodontal disease

Besides from the obvious dental hygiene habits like brushing teeth and the tongue after every meal to remove food and plaque, flossing and using an antibacterial mouthwash, there are also dietary measures that can be put in place to offer extra support. The key is avoid sugar, in all its forms, including the seemingly ‘natural’ alternatives to regular cane sugar, as well as focusing on a diet that helps to stabilise blood sugar levels.

• There is one exception, however, which is xylitol, a ‘sugar alcohol’, which is used in toothpastes, mouthwashes and sweets given to children to PREVENT dental decay. The reason is that these teeth-rotting bacteria, if given xyltiol, can no longer stick to teeth, thus reducing risk.
• Here are some examples of sugar substitutes to be aware of and avoid: Dextrose, Fructose, Galactose, Glucose, Lactose, Maltose, Sucrose, Beet sugar, Cane juice crystals, Coconut sugar, Corn syrup solids, Crystalline fructose, Date sugar, Dextrin, Diastatic malt, Ethyl maltol, Florida crystals, Glucose syrup solids, Grape concentrate, Maltodextrin, Agave Nectar/Syrup, Barley malt, Blackstrap molasses, Brown rice syrup, Buttered sugar/buttercream, Caramel, Carob syrup, Corn syrup, Evaporated cane juice, Fruit juice, Fruit juice concentrate, Golden syrup, High-Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS), Honey, Invert sugar, Malt syrup, Maple syrup, Molasses, Rice syrup, Refiner’s syrup, Sorghum syrup, Treacle.
• Avoid fruit juices and in particular shop-bought fruit juices, which often contain fruit concentrates. Whilst fruit is a natural form of sugar, fruit juices often contain the juice of the fruit without its pulp or fibre. This means that it is very quickly converted into glucose (sugar) in the body, which leads to blood sugar imbalances and eventually insulin resistance, if consumed too frequently.
• Eat a diet that mainly consists of foods in their natural form, paying attention to meals that prioritise protein such as in pulses, eggs, poultry, meat and fish, along with a wide variety of vegetables and healthy fats found in nuts and seeds, avocado and extra virgin olive oil.
• Switch refined carbohydrates for complex carbohydrates – these are foods that are naturally high in fibre such as whole grains like brown rice, wholemeal bread, quinoa and oats, as well as starchy vegetables like beetroot, sweet potatoes, carrots, pumpkin and butternut squash.

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Gut brain reaction – finding your food allergies and intolerances

If you are suffering from bloating, belching, indigestion, heartburn, abdominal pain, IBS and any other digestive complaint, or brain fog and headaches but after meals, you might be wondering if there’s something you are eating that you are intolerant or allergic to.

If you’ve ruled out indigestion and dysbiosis the next most likely contributor to your digestive problems is a food allergy or intolerance. Allergies are caused by the immune system producing antibodies that ‘attack’ certain food proteins because it considers them as aliens. The most extreme type of allergic reaction involves a type of antibody called IgE. If you have a pin prick allergy test on your arm, in which a drop of potential allergens are put on a pin prick, if you react you get a red wheal. This immediate reaction, within ten minutes, is an IgE reaction. IgE allergy can also be tested from a blood sample.

But many reactions against food involve a different kind of antibody called IgG. Most people call these food intolerances even though they do fit the bill for the definition of an allergic reaction. IgG reactions don’t occur immediately so it isn’t always easy to know what you react to. For this reason it is worth having a test to find out what you may be reacting to. This can be done from a tiny amount of blood, collectable with a home test kit. The leading laboratory is called www.yorktest.com. They send you a kit, you prick your finger (It isn’t painful) and send them the blood as instructed. They then measure the presence of IgG antibodies in your blood and give you a report that tells you how strongly your immune system is reacting against which foods.

Healing the gut

The first step is to avoid those foods you react strongly to. You can ‘rotate’ those foods which produce a mild reaction which means eaten then not more than every five days. (If you eat a reactive food every day your level of reactivity builds up.) Yorktest include a session with a nutritional therapist by phone, who can help you do it right.

The good news is that IgG antibody reactions often go away if you a) avoid the food strictly for 3 to 4 months and b) heal the gut. The same is not true for IgE based reactions. We often develop food intolerances because the gut wall becomes inflamed or damaged allowing incompletely digested food proteins to enter the body and bloodstream. The gut wall is also damaged by alcohol, painkillers, too much coffee and fried foods.

Certain foods irritate the gut wall. An example is wheat, containing gliadin. This is why a lot of people are somewhat intolerant of wheat.

Fortunately, the cells that line the gut wall heal and replenish very quickly, especially when you feed them an amino acid called l-glutamine. So, supplementing l-glutamine can speed up gut healing. If you want to heal a ‘leaky’ gut have 5 grams (a heaped teaspoon) of glutamine powder in cold water (hot water destroys this amino acid) last thing at night or at least half an hour before eating.

In summary, to reduce your immune sensitivity to foods and restore gut health

• Identify and avoid your food intolerances
• Take digestive enzymes with each meal for two weeks thereafter
• Take probiotics daily for two weeks thereafter
• Take glutamine daily for two weeks thereafter

Some digestive supplements provide all three – digestive enzymes, probiotics and glutamine – in one.

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Your deadly bread?

An extremely common gut irritant is wheat, or more specifically gliadin, the name for wheat gluten, found in modern wheat.

Back in the 1970s, Curtis Dohan, a psychiatrist, was publishing cases of people with schizophrenia recovering on a wheat-free diet. Wheat can also exacerbate symptoms of ADHD and autism. This link with mental health problems led to the discovery that modern wheat, in its digestion, generates peptides (combinations of amino acids a bit shorter than a protein) that mimic opioids (heroin and morphine are opioids) called gluteomorphins that occupy the same receptors in the brain as heroin. Gluteomorphins are commonly found in the urine of children diagnosed with autism.

The effect of these gluteomorphins, created when you digest modern wheat, is that you want more. Wheat literally becomes addictive. Combined with the sugar load created by yeast-activated bakery products, and the subsequent blood sugar low, which stimulates appetite, modern wheat is literally an appetite stimulant, making you want to eat more.

This is, of course, great news for the food industry and one of the reasons why wheat-eating nations have a big problem with ever-increasing belly fat. There’s a good book, Wheat Belly by William Davis, which makes the argument as to why our modern day obsession with wheat is driving abdominal weight gain, although he fails to differentiate between the effects of modern wheat and ancient wheat such as khorosan. When you gain abdominal fat, known as visceral fat, it triggers, or is part of the body’s inflammatory response mechanism. This, in turn, makes you both more likely to become intolerant or allergic, and to develop inflammatory symptoms, the classics being headaches, eczema or dermatitis, asthma, irritable bowel diseases such as Crohn’s and ulcerative colitis, rhinitis, arthritis and just about any ‘itis’. While the general view is that ‘gluten’ is the culprit this simplistic opinion doesn’t take into account a series of experiments carried out on an ancient khorasan wheat. Technically it does contain gluten proteins and, as such, should promote inflammation. However, it doesn’t. In numerous studies it does the opposite.

A randomised double-blind study was published on people with irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), carried out by researchers at the University of Florence in Italy. The participants were given foods (bread, pasta, biscuits, and crackers) made from either modern wheat or Kamut wheat. They didn’t know what kind of food they were eating. During the modern wheat weeks they had no improvement, and continued to suffer from abdominal pain, bloating, tiredness and irregular and unhealthy bowel movements. However, when they were unknowingly eating khorosan wheat, everything improved. They reported significantly less bloating, abdominal pain, irregularity and tiredness, with a much higher overall measure of quality of life.

Also, convincingly, markers of inflammation in the blood, known as pro-inflammatory cytokines (IL-6, IL-7, INFgamma, MCP-1, VEGF), which are usually raised in people with IBS, all reduced. This is exactly the opposite of what one would expect with conventional wheat, high in gluten proteins. This effect as seen in blood markers has been found in every human trial using Kamut khorosan, including in people with cardiovascular disease, diabetes and fatty liver disease.

Your homework this week is to go wheat gluten-free, perhaps having oat cakes and whole rye bread, such as Scandivanian style vollkornbröd instead. If that makes a difference to how you feel, and you can get hold of some khorosan flour or bread, often sold under the Kamut brand, see how you feel on this ancient grain even though it contains gluten.

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Digestive irritants to avoid

Many substances we consume on a daily basis, quite apart from those foods we are allergic to, are digestive irritants.

This includes alcohol, antibiotics, pain killers, certain spices, wheat, coffee and tea. In excess, these alone can be the cause of digestive problems.

If you do suffer from digestive problems, having a week without any of these is a good way to ‘test’. Alcohol is always a digestive irritant but the quantity makes a big difference. Also, many people react to something in drinks, be it yeast in beer or sulphites in wines. So having yeast-free drink or a sulphite-free wine and seeing how you feel can test this out.

Caffeine, especially coffee, is a gastrointestinal irritant. Many use it to ‘force’ bowel evacuation, which should occur naturally, without the need for such a stimulant. We will be addressing this later, and giving you natural solutions, if this is a problem area for you.

Both antibiotics and NSAID painkillers irritate the gut. The current medical vogue is to also give antacid PPI drugs to counter this side-effect but that is adding one further digestive disruptor. In the case of antibiotics it is important to follow any course with two weeks of probiotics – beneficial bacteria such as Lactobacillus Acidophilus and Bifido bacteria – to reinoculate the gut.

Instead of relying on painkillers exploring what’s driving pain and resolving it is a better long-term solution.

Read this Report in your library: Digestive Irritants to Avoid

 

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