Protect Yourself From Serious Illness

Surprisingly Simple Longevity Tests

No one can predict exactly how long you'll live, but researchers have devised some surprisingly simple tests that are strongly correlated with a risk of early death - or a longer life - in the years to come.  Here's a look at some basic ways scientists are attempting to assess your physical capability and the associated chances of living longer. Being in good shape doesn't have anything to do with "how strong you are". Being fit and healthy is what keeps us from have a serious illness. We can get a head cold and it never slows us down but if we get some type of bronchial infection that's serious. Take the simple test below and see how fit you are. 

1.   Sitting-Rising Test:  Developed in the late 1990s by Brazilian scientist Claudio Gil Soares de Araujo at Gama Filho University in Rio de Janeiro, this test simply involves going from a standing position in a small (2 meters by 2 meters) area, to a sitting position on the floor, and then rising again.

Subjects are scored according to how many supports they require to perform the cycle: a point lost for using a hand, forearm, or knee, for example, to either sit or stand.  Another half-point is deducted for generally unstable execution.  A total of 10 points can be achieved for each full cycle.

In a 2014 paper published in the European Journal of Preventive Cardiology, Araujo and others discovered that older adults had a 5-6 times greater risk of mortality during the 6.3-year follow-up period, if they scored only 0-3 points on the test, relative to the top-performers scoring between 8-10 points.  A total of 2002 adults between the ages of 51 and 80 years participated in the study.

Araujo's team writes that the Sitting-Rising Test (SRT) is a simple gauge of musculoskeletal fitness, with the capacity to predict mortality among community-dwelling adults in this age range.

2.    Grip Strength:   The strength of your hand grip is typically measured using an electronic dynamometer.  In numerous studies, a stronger grip has been linked with lower all-cause mortality, especially among older adults. In the 2014 UK study of adults aged 53, women's grip strength ranged from 21kg (46lb) to almost 34kg (75lb), while the men squeezed from 36kg (79lb) to 54.5kg (120lb).  Averaged across both sexes, and taking other risk factors like body mass index, smoking status and physical activity levels into account, the 53-year olds with the poorest grip strength had anywhere from a 29% to 98% greater risk of death from any cause during the 13 years of follow-up.

3.    Standing Balance Time:  The same 2014 BMJ paper examined how long its subjects could stand on one foot with their eyes closed.

 The resulting times were short, with a maximum average of just 19 seconds for men, and 10 seconds for women.  The good news: achieving simply those brief standing balance times was linked with lower mortality.  Poor performers of the standing balance test -  clocking in at just 3 seconds for both women and men - had a 2.5 greater chance of dying from any cause, during the 13-year study.

4.    Sitting Height:  If you think your overall height is the only tallness measure researchers are interested in, you're wrong.  Sitting height, an anthropometric measurement which compares the relative proportions of the torso and legs, has been linked in Western populations to the incidence of heart disease. Greater leg length (and less relative sitting height) has been viewed as an indicator of better childhood health, which may protect against age-related illnesses like heart disease and diabetes in adulthood.  

5.    Gait Speed:  Can how fast you naturally walk say anything about your longevity?  Yes - according to epidemiologists from the University of Pittsburgh and elsewhere, in their 2011 paper published in JAMA. The researchers examined 9 separate studies involving a total of 34,485 participants and found that among both sexes, gait speed was linked with survival at all ages. A natural gait speed of 0.8 metres/second (about 1.8 miles/hour) corresponded with average life expectancy for each age; walking faster than that as a natural pace was linked with better than average longevity.

Since walking requires energy, balance, and engages multiple organ systems to work together, the researchers suggest slower speed may indicate hidden illness or poor overall conditioning.

6.    Waist to Height Ratio:  Some researchers believe that waist to height ratio - calculated by dividing the waist circumference in centimetres by a person's height (also measured in centimetres) is a better predictor of disease than weight or body mass index.  The advice is simple: keep your abdominal fat down, and make sure your waist measurement is not greater than half your height.

Bottom line:  These tests are simple tools to measure the statistical probability of an early death, as indictors of overall health and conditioning.  You can improve your own odds of living a long, healthy life by staying physically active, eating an anti-aging diet, staying active within your social circle, keeping stress at bay, not smoking, and drinking only in moderation.

I like the Waist to Height Ratio as being the best way you have to know that you have too much fat. Some woman become very concerned with fat arms or fat legs but the only fat that's important is belly fat. Once you lose your belly fat the fat in other places will also drop off. 

If you really want to lose your body fat than look for my e-books at the websites listed below. You'll get information on Healthy eating, exercise, and diet. Instead of spending hours on the internet reading dozens of posts, you can save time by picking up one of my e-books. 

There are two e-books. “How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight?” is available at all the online bookstores selling for $1.99. Go to any of the websites below and search the title to find my e-book. This book gives you all you need to lose weight without spending money on gym memberships, diet plans or meal plans. Look for my book. at Amazon.com, B&N.com, iBooks, Kobo.com, Scribd.com, or Gardner Books in the U.K.

My new e-book is available on Smashwords.com, just type “getting to a Healthy Weight” in the search box at the top of the home page. 

Eating Fresh Veggies

About eating more vegetables

So how important is it?

The benefit of nine veggie-serves a day is astounding. Seven servings (not even the nine we recommend) slash your risk of death at any point in time by 42 percent compared to folks who eat one serving a day. Fresh vegetables offer the best protection, each daily serving reduces your overall risk of death by 16 percent (salads reduce risks 13 percent) and each serving of fruit by 4 percent.  

But only around 60 percent of you eat four servings of veggies a day at least four days a week. And French fries (your most favorite veggie) don’t win you any points!

Here’s how you can ace your veggie-serves:

1. Start smart: At breakfast try sliced tomatoes with 100 percent whole grain toast; butternut squash puree added to oatmeal. Get creative. (one serving)
2. Snack smart: Midmorning and afternoon grab carrot and celery spears with non-fat, no-sugar-added Greek yogurt or ¼ cup hummus. (one-two servings)
3. Lunch a bunch: Toss together two cups greens (two servings), ¼ c. tomato (1/2 serving), two tbsp. avocado (1/2 serving), and ¼ c. blueberries (1/2 serving).  (three and a half servings)
4. Dinner—and it’s done: Enjoy mixed, steamed veggies (one cup = two servings) with a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil.

Not enough veggies are one of the big reasons for obesity. Also, eating all your veggies will cure a lot of your health problems. What you eat is what keeps your body functions running properly. Just because you're still alive doesn't mean your body is working properly. Just like an 8-cylinder engine, it can run on 7- cylinders but that doesn't mean it's working properly. 

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Losing body fat should be your goal. Read up on weight loss and losing body fat. It doesn’t cost money to lose weight. The internet is full of free information.

Checkout my other blogs: 

blogonweight.blogspot.com

howbaddoyouwanttoloseweight.blospot.com

But the quickest way and cheapest way is to buy an ebook online and get everything you need in one short read. I have two ebooks on Amazon:

How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight

Getting To A Healthy Weight

Check out one of them, I think you can find all the info you need and plenty of tips on how I lost my body fat. 

Look for my e-books at the websites listed below. You'll get information on Healthy eating, exercise, and diet. Instead of spending hours on the internet reading dozens of posts, you can save time by picking up one of my e-books. 

Go to any of the websites below and search the title to find these e-books. These books give you all you need to lose weight without spending money on gym memberships, diet plans or meal plans. Look for my books at Amazon.com, barnesandnoble.com,

 iBooks, Kobo.com, Scribd.com, or Gardner Books in the U.K.

My new e-book is available on Smashwords.com, just type “getting to a Healthy Weight” in the search box at the top of the home page. 

Starvation Diets Never Work

The face of dieting is changing. For too many years we would diet, lose some weight, the weight would come back and we'd do it all over again. Today diet company's and the diet guru's are taking a different approach. They have finally seen the light and they know the public doesn't believe the claims of quick weight loss and permanent weight loss any longer.

So now, the guru's are preaching reform. Change your life and be a healthier person. Live a healthy lifestyle and you'll lose weight. "Eat clean", that's the new catch phrase. In fact, some say not to weigh yourself. Getting healthy is all about body fat. Lost a couple of pants sizes, that should be your goal. You'll look better and fell better. The scale isn't that important. I only use the scale once a week to see if I'm going in the right direction.

Sounds simple, ya. It's not that easy to forget everything you were taught as a child. To learn to like different foods. We are a product of our parents and other members of our family and if we have weight problems today it might be because of the way we grew up. So now as an adult, why is it that we are first realizing at this stage of our lives, that we need to lose weight. Or maybe we knew about this problem earlier as a teen or even earlier in grade school.

You might know that today pre-school and even grade school kids are not as heavy as they were 10 years ago. Things are changing and young parents are making that change. Kids under 10 years are more physically fit. They are more active and I think that some are starting to eat better. So there is hope that our population will become healthier over time.

But for now, we have to fix our own lives. If we truly want to be healthier we have to be more active and we have to eat better. Just going on another diet is probably not going to work. Oh sure, you might lose a few pounds but can you keep off the weight after you stop dieting. You see, there lies the problem. I'm one of those people who believe "diets don't work". It's a little like smoking because food can be addictive with all the sugars, salt and other chemicals that manufacturers use. Even when you buy produce or meat, chemicals are used to enrich the land where they grow the produce and chemical hormones are used in animals and poultry to stimulate growth. It's hard to get away from addictive in food, but there are new foods coming out, like organic produce and free range poultry and hormone free dairy and beef.

Eating healthy foods is the only way to permanently lose weight and avoiding foods with chemical, high-calorie foods, and processed foods.

I know what everyone is thinking, "those foods are expensive". Yes, I know, but eating healthy is more than just eating healthy foods, eating healthy also means that you have to cut back on the amount of food you eat. For families, this won't be easy. Families have to agree that they want to eat healthier, and that means cutting out the snack food and the high-calorie drinks. After that's done the cost of the healthy foods won't change your food bill.

There's a lot of benefits to eating healthier, especially for kids. They won't be sick as much so they won't miss as many school days. They'll do better in school because they'll be more alert and have more energy.  And being more active in their lives will help them lose body fat. For the adults, you will be more alert and sharper and being more active will help you lose body fat. You'll be more productive at work and at home.  And being a good role model for your kids will get them motivated. Anyone can be thin and trim and you don't have to live in the gym. It's pretty simple, eat clean and eat fresh and do more walking about, one hour a day more.

Losing body fat should be your goal. Read up on weight loss and losing body fat. It doesn’t cost money to lose weight. The internet is full of free information.

But the quickest way and cheapest way is to buy an ebook online and get everything you need in one short read. I have two ebooks on Amazon:

How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight

Getting To A Healthy Weight

Check out one of them, I think you can find all the info you need and plenty of tips on how I lost my body fat. 

Look for my e-books at the websites listed below. You'll get information on Healthy eating, exercise, and diet. Instead of spending hours on the internet reading dozens of posts, you can save time by picking up one of my e-books. 

Go to any of the websites below and search the title to find these e-books. These books give you all you need to lose weight without spending money on gym memberships, diet plans or meal plans. Look for my books at Amazon.com, barnesandnoble.com,

 iBooks, Kobo.com, Scribd.com, or Gardner Books in the U.K.

My new e-book is available on Smashwords.com, just type “getting to a Healthy Weight” in the search box at the top of the home page. 

A Poor Diet Is Tied To Health Problems

I wrote about losing body fat, exercising, and diet so when I found this post on WebMD I wanted to reblog it. I wrote a similar post this week on another blog. I was emphasizing the need for a good diet. You can't tell immediately that your body isn't functioning properly. It takes time, sometimes years and by that time you just think your condition is because of your age, but it not. Your bodies condition is due to a bad diet and lack of exercise or just not active enough. Read the post below for more information on a bad diet.

Study explores which foods and nutrients may be helpful or harmful

By Karen Pallarito

HealthDay Reporter

Nearly half of all deaths from heart disease, stroke, and diabetes in the United States are associated with diets that skimp on certain foods and nutrients, such as vegetables, and exceed optimal levels of others, like salt, a new study finds.

Using available studies and clinical trials, researchers identified 10 dietary factors with the strongest evidence of a protective or harmful association with death due to "cardiometabolic" disease.

"It wasn't just too much 'bad' in the American diet; it's also not enough 'good,'" said lead author Renata Micha.

"Americans are not eating enough fruits, vegetables, nuts/seeds, whole grains, vegetable oils or fish," she said.

Micha is an assistant research professor at the Tufts University School of Nutrition Science and Policy in Boston.

The researchers used data from multiple national sources to examine deaths from cardiometabolic diseases -- heart disease, stroke, and type 2 diabetes and the role that diet may have played.

"In the U.S. in 2012, we observed about 700,000 deaths due to those diseases," Micha said. "Nearly half of these were associated with suboptimal intakes of the 10 dietary factors combined."

Too much salt in people's diets was the leading factor, accounting for nearly 10 percent of cardiometabolic deaths, according to the analysis.

The study identifies 2,000 milligrams a day, or less than 1 teaspoon of salt, as the optimal amount. While experts don't agree on how low to go, there is broad consensus that people consume too much salt, Micha noted.

Other key factors in cardiometabolic death included low intake of nuts and seeds, seafood omega-3 fats, vegetables, fruits and whole grains, and high intake of processed meats (such as cold cuts) and sugar-sweetened beverages.

We are killing ourselves because of what we eat. Lose your body fat, eat the right foods and walk more and you can live a longer, healthier life.

If you really want to lose the extra flab you can get help, I write 4 blogs and I’ve written two E-books. E-books are the easiest and cheapest way to learn about any subject without groping through hundreds of website looking for the material you want.

My first e-book is “HowBadDoYouWantToLoseWeight” and it sells for $2.99 on most online bookstores like Amazon.com, BN.com, iBook, Kobo.com, Scribd.com, and Gardner books in the U.K.

My second e-book is available in the same stores. And on smashwords.com. Just type in the search line “getting to a healthy weight”.

Gaining Weight As We Age

This is a topic I could write a whole book on. But I want to give you a quick explanation in less than 1000 words. First, this happens to all of us. And maybe the body is programed to do just that, because you will loss the ability to fight off disease as you get older and having more body fat can sustain the body during illness. But today we don't need body fat to provide energy. We learned the hard way that excess body fat only slows down body functions. We don't have to gain weight. The body needs less food as you get older.

Most of us don't think constantly about our health. We have other things on our minds and, let's face it, life is complicated today. And if the truth be known, we were not raised to deal with the pressures in today's world. Most of us have difficulty coping with our lives. Some of this we bring on ourselves by trying to absorb too much information and trying to do more than we can possibly handle. But in today's society, we are all most forced to keep pace with others even if that's not possible.

If you're working like most of us, you have to keep the pace that your co-workers set. The theory behind that is, "if they can do it, I can do it" and that's what causes the pressure on us to perform better. For most of us to perform better, we usually have to put more stuff on the back burner. If this sounds like something you 've heard before, putting things on the back burner is the term most of us use instead of saying that I'll put that off till later and then never do it.

Taking care of your personal appearance is usually close to the top of the list. If you know someone who dresses like they're on their way to the gym, the way you might dress at 7 am, and it's after lunch, this might be someone who just wants to dress comfortably or someone who has too much on their to-do list.

The first commitment you have is to yourself and if you have to get up earlier, then do it. Anyone who is running all day like some crazy person, driving over the speed limit all day long is someone who isn't taking care of themselves and setting a bad example to others.

Taking care of yourself is about eating the right way, staying in shape, and setting a good example for others. You will have to work on that but this is all part of living a long happy life. Regular exercise like walking or jogging or maybe a yoga class a long with a good diet and you like before a happier, healthier person and you will slim down. All of this takes time but losing body fat is worth the effort.

If you really want to lose the extra flab you can get help, I write 4 blogs and I’ve written two E-books. E-books are the easiest and cheapest way to learn about any subject without groping through hundreds of website looking for the material you want.

My first e-book is “HowBadDoYouWantToLoseWeight” and it sells for $2.99 on most online bookstores like Amazon.com, BN.com, iBook, Kobo.com, Scribd.com, and Gardner books in the U.K.

My second e-book is available in the same stores. And on smashwords.com.  Just type in the search line “getting to a healthy weight”.

The Reasons You're Addicted To Junk Food

By Shereen Lehman, MS 

This is a good post to read. The mistakes you're making when you make those food choices will affect your life, your performance, and your health for years to come. You can straighten out your health by eating better and exercising more, but in most cases, you can't reclaim all that you lost.

Question: If junk food is so bad for the body and bad quality overall, why is it so popular? You'd think no one would touch it."

Answer: That's an excellent question, and I certainly can't say that I have the answer. I do have some thoughts on the subject -- and maybe one or more are correct, so here goes:

First, let me back up and define 'junk foods.' It's the stuff you eat that has little to no nutritional value, usually combined with ingredients that are bad for you, or is high in calories when consumed in excess.

So that means candy, chips, cookies, cake, sugary soft drinks, greasy burgers, hot dogs, French fries, ice cream, and most things that served at fast food restaurants qualify as junk foods.

So why do so many people eat junk foods? Here are three possible reasons:

#1 It's Cheap

I think one big reason junk food is popular is because a lot of it is cheap to buy. I mean you can go to most any fast food restaurant and order something off a 'dollar' menu of some sort. If you have a couple of bucks in your wallet, you can buy a full meal. 

Same story at the grocery store. Cheap snacks, inexpensive high-sodium and high-fat meals can be found on the shelves. Healthier foods -- like fresh fruits and vegetables-- tend to be more expensive. Those bags or cups of instant ramen noodles cost less than 50 cents, whereas an orange costs a dollar. 

Although a lot of junk food is cheap to buy up front, I think the argument can be made that cheap junk foods end up being more expensive in the long run due to their negative impact on health.

#2 It's Easy

This reason goes along with the being cheap part. Junk food is lurking in vending machines, convenience stores, and even stores that don't typically sell food items might have snacks and sodas near the cashiers. And those instant meals I already mentioned? They're easy to prepare, and you can store a bunch of them in your kitchen cabinets for a long time.

Of course, fast foods live up to the name. You can order a fast food meal and then eat it a minute or two later. Or you can order your meal from your car to can save time by wolfing it down while you drive away.

That drive-thru thing isn't good, though. Not only is the food bad for your health, but dropped fries can accumulate in your car, under the seat. And that gets kind of gross.

#3 It's Sweet, Fatty or Salty (Or All Three)

Rarely do junk foods tempt you with delicate or complicated flavors. They pretty much hit you hard with sweet, fatty and salty flavors. I think those simple flavors might be preferred by people who are picky eaters -- it could be the slightly bitter flavor of many vegetables turns some people off, especially kids. 

But it's more than flavor. Various combinations of sugar and fat make for textures people like. Fat makes foods feel smooth and creamy, like ice cream. Starchy potato and corn chips cooked in hot oil have a satisfying crunch. That's not to say that healthy foods don't have a nice texture, but sometimes the textures of fresh fruits and vegetables take a little getting used to.

Then It Becomes a Habit

Since junk foods are easy to find, easy to make, and a lot of them just flat out taste good, consuming them becomes a habit. That's the real problem. I mean eating a candy bar now and then or snarfing down a bag of fries once in awhile isn't all that big a deal. But when junk foods make up a big part of your daily diet, then you run the risk of becoming overweight and obese, plus you're not going to get enough of the nutrients and fiber your body needs for good health.

So, next time you find yourself standing in line at a burger joint or staring at a vending machine, think about how your choice could affect your health. Then walk away and find something better.

Losing body fat should be your goal. Read up on weight loss and losing body fat. It doesn’t cost money to lose weight. The internet is full of free information.

But the quickest way and cheapest way is to buy an ebook online and get everything you need in one short read. I have two ebooks on Amazon:

How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight

Getting To A Healthy Weight

Check out one of them, I think you can find all the info you need and plenty of tips on how I lost my body fat. 

Look for my e-books at the websites listed below. You'll get information on Healthy eating, exercise, and diet. Instead of spending hours on the internet reading dozens of posts, you can save time by picking up one of my e-books. 

Go to any of the websites below and search the title to find these e-books. These books give you all you need to lose weight without spending money on gym memberships, diet plans or meal plans. Look for my books at Amazon.com, barnesandnoble.com,

 iBooks, Kobo.com, Scribd.com, or Gardner Books in the U.K.

My new e-book is available on Smashwords.com, just type “getting to a Healthy Weight” in the search box at the top of the home page. 

Not Exercising Is Just As Bad For Your Health As smoking

New studies show how bad immobility can be. Some people just don't believe working out is necessary. "My grandmother lived to 92 and I never saw her do any exercise." I hear that a lot. I understand but people from that generation lived a hard life. Physical demands on even the housewife were pretty tuff. There was no dishwashers, no washing machines just a tub and a ringer. Before World War II a lot of families didn't have hot water,  the only heat was a coal burning furnace. Homes had no TV's until the 50's and no supermarkets. A housewife worked about 16 hours a day. Most men worked some type of blue collar job. 

The reason I bring up this hard life that those people had from that World War I generation is because they were much healthier because they were much more active than people today. They were actually more active then and healthier than their children. We have to workout today because today we work with our minds and do little physical work compared to our grandparents. Read the short article below 

When you see someone smoking, you might question “Why would you do that to yourself when you know it could kill you?” Do you react the same way when you know someone doesn’t exercise? You should.
When I was at a recent medical conference, one of the presenters reminded the audience that research has shown physical inactivity to be as deadly as smoking. I was shocked at this when I first heard it a couple of years ago, but I think I was just as shocked hearing it the second time. My guess is you are too. It’s hard to imagine being inactive could be comparable to smoking, but it is.
You wouldn’t dream of smoking (and if you do smoke, you’re likely trying to quit), so why poison yourself with inactivity? But many of us do. Nearly 80% of us don’t get the recommended amount of exercise. Many experts agree the inactivity epidemic is more concerning than the obesity epidemic.
The benefits of exercise are numerous and irrefutable. It helps prevent heart disease, diabetes, breast and colon cancer, dementia, depression, and more. If you exercise, chances are you’ll live a longer, healthier life. Period.
What’s so powerful about exercise? Take heart disease, for example. Heart disease is associated with inflammation in the body. Exercise is a natural inflammation fighter. When you move, your muscles send out anti-inflammatory chemicals.
Also, every time you get up and move, your blood sugar, cholesterol, and triglycerides improve. When you sit down, they get worse. It’s just about moving more.
If you’re not active now, I’m sure it sounds overwhelming to start an exercise program. The good news is you can see health benefits with even a small amount of activity. Even taking a daily 5-minute walk around the office will improve your health. Slowly build up from there.
Ultimately, you want your goal to be 30 minutes at least 5 days a week of moderate exercise. We’re talking about a brisk walk– hard enough that you can talk comfortably but not able to sing. But take your time getting there. Throw in resistance exercises a couple of days a week, and you’re on track.
If you’ve tried exercise before and didn’t lose weight, don’t be discouraged. You are still getting health benefits even if you’re not shedding weight. If you’re overweight but active and fit, you can expect to live as long and healthy as someone who is normal weight and fit. Even if you’re obese, being active helps you live a longer, healthier life than a normal weight person who isn’t active.
Think you’re too old for it to matter? Hardly. Regardless of your age, getting active has enormous benefits even in your 80s and beyond. We’re not just talking about living longer, but living better with a higher quality of life.
As British-American anthropologist, Ashley Montagu once said, “The idea is to die young as late as possible.” Stay fit and healthy as long as you can.