Does Whole Milk Reduce Diabetes?

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Full-fat foods are back in the headlines in light of the recent proclamations by the USDA. I don’t know about you, but it’s been decades since I drank whole milk or ate whole fat yogurt or cheese. It’s not just about the calories; it just doesn’t seem to taste as good. Have I been missing something? Headlines tend to exaggerate, especially when they are based on press releases. Let’s take a look behind the headlines at the research behind the proclamation.

In the first paper, researchers examined the data from both the Nurses Health Study and the Healthcare Professionals Follow-up Study. I’ve talked about these large studies many times before. They examined blood samples taken in the 1990s for fatty acids that would typically come from eating and drinking milk products. In a sub-sample of subjects, those who had higher fatty acids from milk products in their plasma and blood cells had a 45% reduced rate of developing type 2 diabetes an average of 15 years later.

We’ll take a look at the second study on Thursday. (We’ve still been having computer problems—that’s why you’re getting the Memo today instead of last Saturday and why we’re sending a second Memo on Thursday.)

The next webinar, Taking Back Your Muscle, Part 2: Protein, is available for purchase now. If you’ve ever had any questions about protein, amino acids, or creatine, this webinar is for you. I added one more topic that fits with protein and that’s the role of peptides, short chains of amino acids that are a hot topic today. Find out what they are, what do they do, and how much you need by joining me Sunday at 1.p.m.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Reference: circ.ahajournals.org/content/early/2016/03/22/CIRCULATIONAHA.115.018410

Your Questions Answered

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Thank you for all the prayers and well wishes; Paula has been doing great in her recovery from shoulder-replacement surgery. She’s abiding by all the restrictions on trying to use the arm and looks forward to beginning rehab.

If you were looking for the Super Bowl Webinar this past Sunday, it wasn’t held—yet. I forgot to inform everyone that the next Aging with a Vengeance webinar will be held on Sunday, February 22, at 1 p.m. The webinar should be in the store ready for sale by next Sunday.

Beginning Saturday, I’ll update some Memos that examined full-fat dairy products. That’s pertinent today because the new dietary guidelines encourage their consumption. Justified? You be the judge after reading the research.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Your Heart: Tone

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If you live to 80, your heart will beat an average of three billion times. That’s right—billion with a b. Faster when you exercise, slower when you’re at rest, it does its job 24 hours a day, seven days a week. What’s even more amazing about your heart rate is how it’s controlled by the nervous system. I’ve always found it fascinating and here’s why.

The SA node or pacemaker of the heart we talked about Tuesday normally gets signals from nerves that tell it to slow down and nerves that tell it to speed up; one is inhibitory to slow it down while the other is stimulatory to speed it up, but they’re both sending signals at the same time. Where they balance is called tone and sets your resting heart rate. Start to exercise and more stimulatory impulses come to speed up your heart rate. Stop exercising and more inhibitory are sent until you reach a resting heart rate again. Exercise regularly and your heart can reset the tone at a lower rate by increasing the inhibitory and decreasing the stimulatory. You don’t even have to think about it.

There are other mechanisms that control heart rate, such as the fight or flight hormones. Maybe you think of your heart and decide, “I don’t like your tone!” The good news is you can change it; most of the time the tone you set by your lifestyle is the heart rate you’re going to have.

I hope you know more about your heart than you did before; I think it’s important to know as much as you can about the body your brain lives in. Now go forth and live a heart-healthy lifestyle to keep everything working smoothly.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Your Heart: Autorhythmicity

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Your heart can beat over 200 times per minute during maximal exercise, depending on your age, yet every beat is a succinct event made up of many steps with every one of those beats controlled by the electrical system of the heart. While that’s incredible in and of itself, the real story is one of the most amazing features of your heart called autorhythmicity.

Your heart has a special area in one chamber that stimulates it to beat. It’s called the sino-atrial node (SA node) or the pacemaker. Think of that as the command center: it takes information coming from your body and sets the pace of your heart rate.

What you might not know is that some cells of the heart can stimulate themselves to beat. If something goes wrong with the electrical system for some reason, your heart can go right on beating because of the muscle make-up we talked about in Saturday’s Memo on syncytium. It lends itself to this autorhythmic feature. Think of it as the ultimate fail-safe system—makes you sleep a little easier, doesn’t it?

One more cool feature I’ll talk about on Saturday.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Your Heart: Syncytium

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The next few Memos were from 2016 and are still relevant today! This is why your heart is special. Let’s begin American Heart Month with some facts you probably didn’t know about your heart. Your heart is unique in many ways, and you’re going to learn about a few of them.

The heart muscle is similar to skeletal muscle in the way it contracts, but that’s where the similarity ends. While skeletal muscle is laid out in parallel fashion and independent of one another, the heart muscle splits and connects to other fibers. In that way, every heart muscle cell connects to every other heart muscle cell, and that allows signals to be transferred very quickly. It’s referred to as a syncytium (pronounced sinˈsiSHəm) because it can act as a single unit.

But the heart must contract in specific locations at the correct time in order for blood to be pumped. The heart has to contract at the upper chambers first, the atria, and then the bottom of the lower chambers called the ventricles. That allows the blood to be pumped from the upper chambers to the lower, then from the lower chambers through arteries to the body.

Pretty cool, isn’t it? Wait until you read Tuesday’s Memo about the electrical system of the heart.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Physics and Movement

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Did you know that in the ancient games held when the Olympics began, long jumpers were allowed to carry one-kilogram rocks in each hand? That gave them extra momentum as they leapt into the air while thrusting their arms forward. Then they thrust their arms backward before landing to gain extra distance as they pushed off the rocks. While the distances they leapt may have been embellished, they did jump farther by using physics to help movement.

Have you ever rocked backward before trying to stand up, especially from a deep chair? Using momentum to do curl-ups or trying to do one more repetition in a bicep curl by swinging the weight slightly backward before forward is also okay. You’re using physics to gain an advantage as you gain strength, and that allows you to train at a higher level than you otherwise could. It’s not illegal because this is life, not the Olympics.

Updates

You can still purchase The Keys to Weight Loss webinar or the rebroadcast. For those of you who have already purchased it, the link will be sent by email when it’s ready. An update video will be coming later this week for everyone who purchased the webinar.

After Thursday, Paula will be recovering from getting her shoulder replaced, so we’ll be running some of my favorite Memos from the past for the next couple of weeks.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Get a Grip!

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Did you know that people in the lowest 20% of grip strength have an increased risk of mortality—a 350% increase in all-cause mortality? That’s true for both men and women. On a more practical level, ever have trouble opening the tops of bottles or other simple things that require grip strength? I know I have, and believe me, I’m not happy about it.

The simplest exercise you can perform to increase grip strength is to squeeze a ball that has some give to it; I use a pleather ball Riley had when he was a toddler. I’m working up to a spongy baseball. You can also use Play-Doh or clay, but that would require washing your hands afterward as you’ll retain some of the oils. Rhythmically squeeze the ball and relax for a minute, then switch to the other hand. After that, squeeze the ball as hard as you can for 5 to 10 seconds; switch to the other hand, and repeat 10 times. That’s it. You can do that while you’re sitting. I can see it now: “Are you watching TV?” “No, I’m exercising.”

Obviously, that’s a beginning. When you can lift heavier weights, your grip strength will increase. Be a baller; get started on increasing your grip strength today.

The Keys to Weight Loss

The Keys to Weight Loss webinar is tomorrow at 1 p.m. Eastern Time. Registration for the live webinar will end at 11 a.m. tomorrow morning; after that, you can purchase the rebroadcast for $17.95. Either way, Members and Insiders get their discounts as long as they log in first to drchet.com.

Here’s a little taste of what you’ll learn. I’m going to cover the most researched supplements that address the five areas related to weight loss: appetite, hunger, cravings, carbohydrate metabolism, and overall metabolism. The supplement no one thinks of using regularly is digestive enzymes. It may help at least two of the areas I mentioned; I’ll cover why in the webinar.

Whether you’re on a weight loss program or even using one of the weight loss medications, you’ll learn how to increase your odds of losing weight. Don’t wait; sign up today!

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Stronger Shoulders

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This week we’re continuing with the theme of basic exercises: what are the exercises that everyone can do at home with minimal equipment to improve or at least maintain fitness?

Our focus today is on your shoulders. That can include the muscles of the chest, the back, the shoulder cap or more precisely the deltoids, the upper arms, and lower arms. The exercise that works a majority of those muscles is the push-up. That can be challenging for many of us, including me. I’ve torn both my biceps muscles, so that limits my ability to lower my body more than a quarter of the way. But I’ve improved my shoulder strength a couple of ways.

Wall Push-ups

Just like it reads, stand two to three feet away from a wall, depending on your height, with your body straight; if your behind is sticking up, you’re too far from the wall (like the woman in black). Lower your body toward the wall, and then push back up again. It’s critical that you have on shoes that won’t slip and you don’t do it on a throw rug! You don’t need a trip to the dentist.

Another way of doing the same movement is to use the stairs. Always start on the floor and use the step that is most in line with your arms at 90 degrees. Lower yourself down and push back up. As you get stronger, you can move your arms down a step which will increase the resistance.

Finally, if you can get up and down easily, start with push-ups from your knees. Just lower yourself enough so you can push back up. As you get stronger, you can go lower and lower.

Counter Push-ups

If you have a kitchen island or a countertop, you can do counter push-ups, either in addition or instead of wall push-ups. It’s especially important you wear shoes that will not slip and no moveable carpets. I use these to focus on my triceps muscles by keeping my elbows tight against my side and letting those muscles do the work.

The same logic applies to all these exercises. Begin with the number you can do and work up to 25. Then add more sets until you can get to 100 total. When you get there, try to increase the resistance by moving down a step or doing push-ups on the floor.

Another note: as the woman on the right is doing, you can use your desk as your counter. This would be a great action to use when you need to get up from your desk and give your eyes a break from the computer, which none of us probably do often enough.

Webinar on Sunday

Don’t forget The Keys to Weight Loss webinar; there are still slots open for the live webinar on Sunday afternoon. If you sign-up, and you have questions you’d like me to answer during the webinar, send them to drchet@drchet.com. Here’s one tip. While there are strategies that can help with cravings, the best way is to not bring them in the house. I’ll cover the others in the webinar.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Strengthening Your Core

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The most common source of pain for Americans is lower back pain, and your core muscles are the key to avoiding that achy feeling.

Does this sound familiar? You sneeze or you’re bending over a sink brushing your teeth, and you feel a twinge that incapacitates you for the next few days. Yes, you could have ruptured a disc, but more than likely, you’ve strained your lower back muscles. Stretching and strengthening your core can help with that. There are dozens of exercises you can do, but here’s where to begin.

Strengthen the Abdominals

The abdominal muscles get weaker as we get older unless they are trained regularly. While the exercise is often criticized, the old-fashioned curl-ups, also known as crunches, can strengthen most of those muscles. There are two keys to the exercise. First, bend your knees; that forces your lower back into the floor, which helps stretch those tiny muscles in the lower back. Second, with your arms folded across your chest, raise up just enough so your shoulder blades lift off the floor. That’s all the movement you need.

The problem for many people will be two-fold. Your belly may get in the way. Second, you may not be able to get down and up again off the floor. If either of those happen, begin by sitting in a hardback chair. Force your back into the chair and contract your abdominal muscles, sort of like you’re sucking your belly in for a photo. Hold for 2–3 seconds, then relax. You’ll also be contracting the muscles within the pelvis, which is also good for the abs.

Work up to 25 reps and start adding more sets until you can do 100 total. Do them over the course of the day or all at once.

Stretch the Hips and Back

I originally wrote this to deal with hip pain caused by the piriformis muscle, but it’s a basic hip-back stretch. This one is simple—you can do it sitting down. Sit in a straight-backed chair with both feet on the ground. Take your right foot and place it on your left knee. If you viewed it from above, it would look like a figure 4. What if you can’t get your foot on top of your knee because you’re not flexible enough? Cross it anywhere along the lower leg that works, even if you just cross your ankles.

Slowly lean forward until you feel the stretch in your butt and lower back. No bouncing! Just lean forward, gently but firmly, and hold for 15–30 seconds. Then with your hands on your thighs, push your upper body upright; that relieves the pressure on your lower back. Repeat with the other foot to knee. Do that 2–3 times per day, every day until you work up to 10 reps. That will loosen up that piriformis muscle as well as other hip flexors, but most important, it will stretch your lower back.

The Bottom Line

All this seems pretty simple. There are dozens more exercises you can do, but your legs and your core help you move, help with balance, and improve posture. Start here until you can do them five days a week. When you can do more, such as modified planks or leg lifts, that’s great, but you have to start somewhere and this is the start.

Don’t forget to sign up for next Sunday’s webinar on The Keys to Weight Loss. I address the five big concerns that people need help with when using a non-pharmaceutical attempt to lose weight. You don’t want to miss it!

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Fitness: The Basics

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Paula asked me a great question the other day: what are the exercises that everyone can do at home with minimal equipment to improve, or at least maintain, fitness? For all ages? Yes, okay. I can do that. It also helps that I recently started a routine that I do every morning for that purpose. Because, let’s face it, sometimes it’s not very appealing—or even possible—to leave the house. (That’s not our backyard in the photo, but ours looks just like that.)

The first exercise benefits legs: can you “cop a squat” to “pop a squat”? It’s the reason leg strength is important at every age. You may not understand those phrases, so let me explain it another way you may relate to better.

The next time you go into a bathroom to do your thing, you have to sit down. That’s the “cop a squat” part—sitting down. “Pop a squat” generally refers to the act of eliminating waste. All well and good and natural. Then comes the part that requires leg strength: you have to stand up again. That’s the minimal amount of leg strength you need to keep your bathroom visits private. If you can’t do that, you have to rely on someone to assist you.

So, if you value your privacy, work on keeping your legs strong enough to stand up. Simplest way? Stand up and sit down from a solid chair with arms, keeping your legs about a shoulder width apart. You may need to use the arms of the chair or a walker to start pushing yourself up in the beginning, but the goal is to stand without holding anything. Work up to 25 reps where you can sit and stand up straight again. Start adding more sets until you can do 100 total. You can do them over the course of the day or all at once.

No fancy equipment needed to train to cop a squat to pop a squat. Saturday, the complement to leg strength is core strength, and we’ll cover the basics of your core. What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet