Category: Men’s Health and Wellness (Page 40 of 46)

More Reasons to Stay Away from Statins.

October 19, 2007 / Mike Furci

Pharmaceutical companies continue to push cholesterol lowering drugs.? And doctors, who are brain washed, continue to prescribe them with a vengeance.? This, despite the fact, the evidence has never supported their use and continues to show how detrimental to ones health they are.

The following is taken from Wise Traditions, 2007; 8(3).

Most serious is the accumulating evidence that cholesterol lowering is bad for our brains.? One new study indicates that a decline in total cholesterol levels precedes diagnosis of dementia by at least 15 years (Archives of Neurology 2007; 64:103-107).? Evidence that low levels of LDL-cholesterol are associated with Parkinson’s disease have become so strong that a team at the University of North Carolina is planning to explore the link with clinical trials involving thousands of subjects (Reuters, January 15, 2007).? Cholesterol circulating in the bloodstream is unavailable to the brain-both LDL and HDL are too large to pass the blood brain barrier, so cholesterol needed by the brain must be manufactured in the brain.? Statins, however, do pass the barrier and enter the brain where they can interfere with cholesterol production and set the scene for cognitive decline.

Cholesterol, Heart disease, Medical Issues for Men, Men's Health and Wellness

Muscle layoff

August 29, 2007 / Anthony Stalter

There was an interesting question asked in the “Malegrams” section of the August 2007 issue of Men’s Health:

Q: How long can I go without lifting weights before my muscles disappear?

Answer (provided by trainer Mike Mejia): Contrary to popular belief, your muscles don’t turn to mush as soon as you stop lifting. In fact, a recent study of recreational weight lifters found that 6 weeks of inactivity resulted in only a slight decrease in power (10) percent after 2 weeks) and virtually no drop-off in size or strength. You could go the whole summer without pumping iron – as long as you’re keeping fit with activities such as swimming or tennis. These sports help retain muscle mass and offer the perfect physical and mental break from the tedium of the gym. Come fall, you can return to the gum refreshed and ready to take your workouts to the next level.

Interesting. Obviously if your goal is to put on a ton of size, you don’t want to go an entire summer without so much as looking at a weight. But those who get sick of the rigors of a gym routine can find solace – at least from Mr. Mejia and his research – that if you partake in sports and other physical activities, you won’t resemble Calista Flockhart by August.

Magazine Hype, Men's Health and Wellness, Sports Health and Fitness, Xternal Fitness, Xternal Furci

Lift. Heavy. Weights.

August 7, 2007 / Anthony Stalter

One of my closest friends – and amateur bodybuilder – often stresses that it doesn’t get any more complicated than just lifting heavy. He always says, “ Like Dave Draper always says, “Train hard, eat clean, and be happy”.

You can sugar coat it any way you like, but at the end of the day if you’re not challenging yourself in the gym, you can’t expect to reap the benefits. Not only that, if you’re still hitting the same 3×8 with the 30lbs on dumbbell curls you were last year, don’t look in the mirror and wonder why you’re struggling to fill out the sleeves of that Hollister t-shirt your girlfriend bought you last Christmas. The only way to expect muscular gains is by challenging your muscles to handle greater and greater loads. The only way to do that is by fighting each and every session to increase the weights you’re using.

Anyone who thinks that light weights and high reps are the keys to getting ripped is kidding himself. You want to get huge? Lift heavy weights. You want to get ripped? Lift heavy weights. What’s the main difference? Nutrition. Feel free to cycle your training and throw in some moderate to light work to give the central nervous system a break, but the meat and potatoes needs to be heavy and demanding. So join the battle on the rubber mats the next time you’re training and blast it. Start leaving the gym with the knowledge that you defeated the iron – it did not defeat you. As the days fall away and those small victories start to add up, the time will come when you’ll reach the mountaintop only to set new goals and dreams far beyond anything you ever thought you could accomplish. Now that’s hard work and there isn’t anything finer.

Bodybuilding, Exercise, General fitness, General training, Men's Health and Wellness, Motivation, Power lifting, Weight training, Xternal Fitness, Xternal Furci

Prevnting cataracts.

July 18, 2007 / Mike Furci

?The human eye, especially in youth, is very elastic and can change its shape to see things that are either near or far away. This elasticity diminishes with age and is caused by free radicals that make the lens stiffer and less transparent. We call this gradual cloudiness a cataract.

Risk factors include age (over 50), blue eyes, blonde hair, smoking, poor nutrition, diabetes, those who work outdoors, and those who don’t wear UVA-UVB eye protection.

But vision loss doesn’t automatically come with age, and following these three steps will protect you from developing cataracts:

Change Your Diet. Eliminate all omega-6 oils (corn, safflower, sunflower, canola, soybean and peanut oils), trans-fatty acids (partially hydrogenated oils and many hydrogenated oils), excess sugar, fructose, monosodium glutamate (MSG), Aspartame, hydrolyzed proteins, soy proteins and toxic metals.
Eat Five Servings of Fresh Fruits and Vegetables a Day (preferably organic). They should include broccoli, Brussels sprouts, spinach, red cabbage, cauliflower, and kale.
Add Supplements to Your Diet. Take a multivitamin/mineral supplement that contains all essential vitamins and minerals but does not contain iron, which is a powerful generator of free radicals. Take 1,000 mg of vitamin C (buffered as calcium and/or magnesium ascorbate) three times a day between meals. Also take two 20 mg of lutein daily, 25,000 IU of mixed carotenoids, 500 mg of riboflavin, 800 to 1,000 IU of vitamin E, and 160 mg of bilberry each day with food. In addition, use N-acetylcarnosine eye drops. You can get the eye drops from www.iHerb.com.

Dr. Blaylock’s Health Alerts

Men's Health and Wellness, Nutrition

8 Foods that may lower your cholesterol

July 10, 2007 / Anthony Stalter

MSN.com posted a recent article dedicated to the eight foods that may help lower your chlestorel.

The 8:

? Oats
? Almonds
? Beans & Lentils
? Blueberries
? Barley
? Avocadoes
? Alcohol

Beware of the last one listed, however. While the article preaches that drinking a glass of any alcoholic beverage has been shown to raise good-cholesterol levels and lower the risk of a heart attack, it also stresses that excessive drinking raises heart-disease risk.

Cholesterol, Men's Health and Wellness, Nutrition, Xternal Fitness, Xternal Furci