How to age gracefully

Everywhere in this world we notice some common physical and mental changes in our population while aging. People suffer from fall in energy level, loss of memory, thinning and sagging of muscles, loss of bone mass density,wrinkling of skin,loss of hearing(specially in case of high frequency sounds), fall of teeth and gradual disability of taste buds in recognizing different tastes. Changes are noticed in the thymus gland and it losses 5 -10% of it's own weight within 50 years of age. Above 65 years of age, one third of males and half of females suffer from some form of arthritis. 50% of males and females suffer from loss of teeth. Older persons require double the amount of insulin than their younger counter parts. After 55 years of age, our body gradually loses it's weight due to decay of cells, tissues and bones. The body of a 70 year old person loses 36% of it's cell mass as compared to a 25 year old person. Although our body tends to gain fat till 60 years, our muscle strength gets reduced by 30 - 40% within 30 to 40 years of age. Insomnia steps in at old age because of less rapid eye movement(R.E.M) during sleep at this time. Natural reflex action of our body also gets reduced during old age. 42% of the population within(52 - 64 years), 73% within(65 - 74 years) and 92% above 75 years, suffer from presbyopia an eyesight problem related with seeing objects nearer to the eyes. Maximum persons above 75 years, suffer from cataract. After 85 years many people loses some form of physical ability.

The main reason of aging is, our body can not properly expel the toxic waste materials formed in the different organs in our body, due to metabolism. These harmful toxic residues are mainly liable for enhancing our aging process. For proper functioning and for maintaining the right temperature of our body, the living cells in our body have to oxidize or burn the digested food all the time through out our life. Each living cell requires glucose, protein and fat for functioning. The food, after being digested and absorbed by metabolism, reaches every cell through our blood. The cells then utilizes the oxygen we inhale, for oxidizing or burning our digested food, thereby producing energy and waste materials. The basic elements of our food are carbohydrate, fat and protein. These are again comprised of carbon, oxygen, nitrogen and hydrogen which after oxidation produces byproducts like carbonic acid, uric acid, lactic acid, ammonia and fatty acids. These toxic byproducts are acidic in nature and requires to be eliminated from from our body through urine and sweat But unfortunately because of our unusual lifestyle( excessive eating, eating junk and processed food, excessive workload, reckless living, too little rest, no exercise, drinking, smoking, pollution etc.), we can not eliminate these toxic acidic waste completely from our body. And hence these detrimental wastes get deposited in each of our cells. These are the main causes of our premature aging.
Our blood is basically alkaline(pH 7.44) in nature. Because of aging, this pH level falls to 7.35 or even below.This difference may seem to be very negligible but as pH value is measured in logarithmic scale, the OH ions for pH 7.44 are 1.23 times higher than for pH 7.35. Simply stated, this is why younger persons carry 23% more oxygen in their blood than older persons.
The uric acid produced in our body is barely soluble in water but dissolves in alkaline medium. Due to the fall of pH level in blood for older persons, this uric acid being insoluble in blood, gets deposited at the joints and causes arthritis. In such cases, drinking alkaline water gradually raises the pH level in blood and reduces the pain and inflammation caused by arthritis.
Aging gradually weakens our excretion system and these toxic acidic wastes slowly gets deposited in the different organs of our body over a long period of time. Hence functioning of some of the organs gets impaired in the process.
Healthy cells in our body requires an alkaline pH level. While aging, because of increase in acidic pH level inside our body, many healthy cells are destroyed slowly and some of the cells even loses their own character in this acidic condition. These cells may cause cancer because a cancerous cell have been observed to be acidic in nature whereas a healthy cell is alkaline in nature. Although the cancer affected cell can be removed by surgery, emergence of cancer can not be ruled out as long as that area inside the body remains acidic.
These waste materials can get deposited in different areas of the body for different people. There are no hard and fast rules. But deposition of wastes in certain places in our body can lead to some specific diseases related with those parts.

Diseases which usually affect aged persons are:
heart problems, high blood pressure, diabetes, prostrate gland complications, any type of cancer, osteoporosis, osteoarthritis, cataract, loss of hearing, dental problems, thinning and weakening of muscles, nerve diseases, alzheimer's disease, parkinson's disease, senile epilepsy, brain stroke etc. Of course that doesn't mean that younger persons don't suffer from such diseases, but aging often makes these diseases more acute because of gradual declination of our immune system.
Common old age diseases:
Cancer:
We are more prone to suffer from cancer after middle age, than in young age. Above 50-55 years, chances of prostrate cancer among males and breast cancer, cervical cancer, vaginal cancer among females, increases considerably.
Diabetes:
Improper functioning of our metabolic system or changes in functioning of some organs because of aging, often causes diabetes. Prolonged diabetes can damage some organs in our body and may ultimately lead to death.
Arthritis:
Aging gradually lessen the amount of calcium in our bones, which leads to less bone mass density. This causes weakening and brittleness of bones. Types of arthritis are osteoarthritis, osteoporosis, rheumatoid arthritis, neuritis,fibrocitis, spondylosis, gout etc. These may severely affect and restrict the movement of limbs of older persons.
Breathing troubles:
Because of declination of the immune system, older persons suffer more from cough and cold, chronic asthma, pneumonia, bronchitis, pleurisy etc.
Reproductive organ diseases:
Males may suffer from enlargement of prostrate gland, urine infection, frequent urination, less urination etc. and females are prone to suffer from infection in vagina, sagging of vagina, cervical tumor etc.
Blood vessel related problems:
After forty years of age, lipids tends to deposit in the inner wall of blood vessels and forms plaque, thereby resisting the flow of blood. This may result in rupture of blood vessel because of blood pressure.
Sexual problems:
Females tend to lose their reproductive ability within 40-50 years of age. In most cases, sexual desire diminishes while approaching old age, for both males and females. This may cause mental detachment between husband wife and sometimes mental problem surfaces because of it.
Nerve diseases:
Our nervous system also refuses to function properly during old age. Neurotransmitters in some parts of the brain doesn't work smoothly because of imbalance in chemical secretion and drying of nerves. This results in parkinson's disease, alzheimer's disease, dementia, epilepsy etc.
Skin problems:
Wrinkled and dry skin, deep facial lines, black patches and red rashes are common in old age. The layer of fat beneath our skin can not retain enough moisture to help maintain the elasticity of our skin. That's why the skin gets wrinkled, dry and itchy. Also the fine blood vessels beneath the skin gets ruptured easily causing red and black patches in our skin.
Psychological problems:
Lack of physical efficiency and fitness, fall in energy level, loneliness, frustration and inability to adapt with old age lifestyle often causes some psychological problems.

Our thought process determines how young we are, not our age. We can remain youthful and energetic in our mind although we age with time.
The main cause of aging is improper functioning of our excretion system. So by cleansing our body from the toxic residual wastes can be a step towards the anti aging process. This can be effected in two stages.
1) Maintaining a healthy system for elimination of these wastes from our body.
2) Extraction of the old wastes already deposited in different parts of our body.
We already know that these wastes are eliminated from our body through urine and sweat. So we need to drink adequate quantity of water. Again drinking of alkaline water is much more effective than plain water, as we know that these toxic wastes are mainly acidic in character. Plain water can be transformed into alkaline water through an apparatus known as water ionizer. A quality water ionizer can convert plain drinking water to 9 or higher pH level of alkaline content in it. This alkaline water neutralizes the acidic wastes inside our body and helps extract those out of our body. Drinking 4 - 6 glass of alkaline water is sufficient for extraction of wastes from our body.

We can prevent premature aging by having proper balance in our food habit. Adequate nutrition and physical exercise can cure and repair the damages inside our body. For this,our body require two things, energy and raw material(food).Our body is made of innumerable living cells. Like all living bodies, the cells of our body requires the right type of food for staying healthy. Throughout our life, the older cells of our body are constantly being replaced by the newer ones. Three things may happen in the process.
1) A cell may be replaced by a new but weak cell. Lack of proper nutrition causes it. This leads to degeneration of our health.
2) A cell may be replaced by a cell with same strength. It means, no improvement is happening with our health. That is, a chronic situation have set in.
3) A cell may be replaced with a more healthy cell. This happens when there is enough energy and raw material in our body. This may be called, emergence of life and this is prevention of aging.

Our food can be broadly characterized in two different types i.e. acidic and alkaline. After metabolism, these two types of food produces acids and alkalies respectively. Our body continuously produces waste materials. These wastes are mainly acidic and toxic in nature. Toxic wastes makes us tired, causes inflammation and pain in our body and enhances aging. So to remain young and healthy and to prevent premature aging,we should eat less food which are acidic in nature. Coffee, soft drinks, fast food, processed meat, sugar,sweets etc., forms toxic wastes after metabolism. Carbohydrates and proteins also produce toxic wastes. Of course, that doesn't mean we wont eat carbohydrates and proteins but a balance should be maintained in overall food intake.To maintain this balance, we should have different items in our food and these would help prevent aging.
But how?
We should keep an watch on our regular diet for slowing down or controlling the aging process. Nutritious foods containing plenty of vitamins and minerals e.g. Vitamin B1, B6, B12, Vitamin C, Vitamin D3, Vitamin E, Folic acid, Calcium, Magnesium, Manganese, Zinc, Iron, Selenium and Folic acid must be added in our diet.

One of the major factors which enhances the aging process are free radicals. Free radicals are highly reactive oxygen ions which are continuously formed inside our body because of the oxidation process which takes place during metabolism of our digested food for producing heat and energy. Besides this, free radicals are also caused from environmental pollution, food additives, high fat diet, excessive alcohol, smoking and passive smoke inhalation, burns, infection, stress, radiation and nutrient deficiencies. These free radicals are highly unstable in nature because they are devoid of one electron. To become stable, they extract one electron from the nearby cells in our body. Naturally, new free radicals are formed in those cells as each of them also then lacks one electron. When this process gets out of control, then within a few seconds millions of free radicals are produced inside our body through chain reaction. In the process, these free radicals destroys the cell walls and damages the DNA stored in the chromosomes within the cells thereby impairing the main functions of our cells. Free radicals are mainly responsible for premature aging and some diseases e.g. heart diseases, diabetes, arthritis, cancer and many more.

Fortunately our body has an inbuilt system for fighting these free radicals and it is the anti oxidant defense mechanism of our body. By this mechanism our body takes help from some elements with extra electrons. These elements does not produce any new free radicals even after sacrificing their own electrons to the free radicals. These elements are known as anti oxidants and they have extra electrons to neutralize the free radicals. Common anti oxidants are Vitamin C, Vitamin E, Beta carotene, Bio flavonoids, Zinc, Selenium, OPCs and Alpha lipoic acid to name a few.

Oligomeric proanthocyanidins (OPCs)
OPCs are known to be as one of the most powerful anti oxidants and are found in some varieties of plants. OPCs are 50 times powerful than Vitamin E and 20 times powerful than Vitamin C in scavenging free radicals. The best source of OPCs are a combination of grape seeds extract, red wine extract and or pine bark extract.
Recent research have provided some beneficial effects of OPCs.
Reduces cardiovascular problems:
O.P.C reduces the risks of some cardiovascular problems e.g. arteriosclerosis (stiffening of arteries), heart attack and stroke, by resisting formation of histamine. This helps inhibiting inflammation and protecting arteries from abnormal cell mutation.
Reduces arthritis and allergic problems:
Reduction of inflammation helps reducing joint pains because of arthritis. Allergic problems are caused because of formation of histamine in our body. OPCs resist formation of histamine, thereby reducing allergic problems.
Helps prevent wrinkling of skin:
Our skin is mainly formed by proteins known as collagen and elastin. OPCs help protect skin by protecting Vitamin C, one of the key ingredient of collagen and elastin. It is also highly effective in neutralizing free radicals attack on our skin and thus prevent aging and wrinkling of our skin.
Stimulates brain activities:
OPCs help improve memory and other functions of brain because they are non toxic and can easily cross the blood brain barrier. OPCs also reduce risk of cerebral stroke.
Besides these, OPCs also help improve eyesight, prevents cataract, fights diabetes, and reduces risks of cancer.
Alpha lipoic acid :
It is a fat and water soluble strong anti oxidant. Because of being soluble in fat and water, this anti oxidant can travel freely within our body and so can fight the free radicals everywhere within our body. Also, it can be mentioned that Vitamin C and Vitamin E are soluble respectively in water and fat. That's why they act separately in fluid and fat mediums within our body. But Alpha lipoic acid, being able to work both in water and fat medium, helps reactivate Vitamin C and Vitamin E in their respective mediums. Besides these, Alpha lipoic acid also helps eliminate heavy metals e.g. lead, cadmium and mercury from our body and thus keeps our liver free from the toxic effect of these elements.
N acetyl cysteine(N.A.C) : This a strong anti oxidant derived from cysteine amino acid. It helps scavenging the free radicals by producing a compound known as glutathione, inside our body. This anti oxidant also has an important role in preventing lung cancer.
Green Tea :
Green tea is also one of the powerful anti oxidants. It is 100 times powerful than Vitamin C and 20 times more powerful than Vitamin E. The effectiveness of green tea is because of the presence of poly phenols in the tea leaves. Green tea prevents premature aging and reduces risks of cancer and heart diseases.
Resveratrol:
Resveratrol is commonly found in many plants. Red wine, peanuts, grapes and blueberries are some of its rich and popular sources. It is a poly phenol flavonoid and a powerful anti oxidant. It prevents blood clotting, inhibits formation of L.D.L and reduces risks of heart attack and stroke. It also helps control aging.
Strawberry :
One of the best source of anti oxidants. Strawberries are rich in Vitamin C, low in calorie and fat. Strawberries contain ellagic acid an anti oxidant which prevents wrinkling and aging of skin. Ellagic acid is known to bind with cancer causing molecules, thereby making them inactive. Studies have shown its anti cancer activities on cancer cells of the breast, oesophagus, skin, colon, prostrate and pancreas. It has antioxidant, anti mutagen and anti cancer properties. Ellagic acid also has anti viral and anti bacterial properties.
Apple :
Apples contain pectin a soluble fat which reduces blood cholesterol and blood glucose. It is also a rich source of Vitamin C.
Beans :
Beans are also a rich source of anti oxidants. Besides, beans contain magnesium, copper, thiamene and dietery fibers.
Nuts( ground nuts peanuts etc.) :
Nuts are also rich source of anti oxidants, proteins, fiber, Vitamin E, riboflavin, magnesium, iron and calcium.
Tomato:
Tomatoes are high in lycopene a strong anti oxidant and also contain some valuable vitamins and minerals. Lycopene prevents oxidation of LDL cholesterol and reduces risks of atherosclerosis and coronary heart diseases.
Spinach:
Researchers have identified 13 different flavonoids in spinach that function as anti oxidants and anti cancer agents. Spinach contain Vitamin K1 and K2 which helps maintain bone health. It is also an excellent source of folate which is needed by the body to convert homocysteine (high level of which can lead to heart attack and stroke) into other benign molecules.

Other than these, there are many other fruits and vegetables known for their anti oxidant and other beneficial properties on our body, which we should eat regularly to keep ourselves fit and healthy.

We should include adequate amount of green leafy vegetables, sprouted grams, beans, peas, grains,bright color fruits, fish and lean meat in our daily diet and drink 4 - 6 glasses of water regularly for keeping ourselves healthy and fit. Also we should eat less amount of fat and sugar. Easily digested carbohydrates e.g. rice, wheat, bread and pasta should be consumed less as these increases the glucose level in our blood and also causes overweight. Trans fats, such as those derived from margarine, cakes, cookies and biscuits, should be avoided. Ideally our body requires mono saturated fats. We can have it from olive oil, canola oil, walnuts and walnut oil. We also require omega 3 and omega 6 fatty acids. Omega 3s can be obtained from flax seeds and flax seed oil, sea fishes e. g. salmon, tuna etc. and omega 6s are available in sunflower oil, corn oil, soy oil etc.
A healthy diet (comprising of 50% fruits and vegetables, 25% protein, 20% carbohydrates, 5% fats and oils) might not be sufficient for providing us with adequate quantities of vitamins and minerals required by our body. We also do not measure the amount of nutrients present in our different food items while eating those. Food supplements(pharmaceutical grade) can help us in making up for the deficiencies of nutrients we get from our daily foods. Hence we should regularly have multivitamins, minerals and anti oxidant supplements which are highly effective in controlling and resisting premature aging.

We all want to keep ourselves young and healthy. Our food helps us with the energy required for our daily activities and healthy living. Some foods are good for our health and some maybe bad. Harmful effects of many foods enhances our aging. So we should try to avoid such foods for staying fit and healthy. Some foods and drinks which are not good for our health are :
*deep fried foods e.g. french fries, chips, *junk foods, *artificially colored foods, *artificially sweetened foods, *processed and preserved foods, *homogenized milk and cheese, *coffee and chocolates, *white bread, *microwave cooked foods, *vegetable oils, *margarine, *soft drinks, *alcohol and *cigarette.

We can resist aging and live healthy by following these simple guide lines.
1) Regularly eat nutritious food rich in proteins, good fats, vitamins, minerals and anti oxidants along with small amount of carbohydrates.
2) Avoid eating food containing excess fat and sugar.
3) Avoid foods which causes oxidation of different elements within our body.
4) Avoid excess drinking of alcohol and quit smoking.
5) Have plenty of anti oxidants to neutralize the free radical attacks.
6) Take food supplements(pharmaceutical grade) regularly to make up for the deficiency of nutrients required by our body.
7) Regularly perform some physical and mental exercises thereby helping stimulate our mind and body.
8) Avoid stress and tension.
9) Have adequate rest and sleep.