Chronic Inflammation and the Aging Process
Last week, you may have stumbled upon this New York Times article about chronic inflammation and how it is related to age-related ailments. Being that you are part of the Cryo Recovery family, there is a good chance that you have read some of our blog posts, social media blurbs, or emails about the role that inflammation plays on health and wellbeing. For those who may have missed it, scientists and doctors alike have determined inflammation to be the root cause of nearly every major disease known to man.
While not all inflammation is dubious in nature, widespread, chronic inflammation is detrimental to our health. If you’d like to read more about inflammation, take a look at our Inflammation Series on the Cryo Recovery blog. There, you can learn more about diet, environment, stress, and the role of sleep on our bodies’ inflammatory levels, along with a myriad of supporting studies. As for today’s blog, we are diving deeper into the NYT article, and giving you the key takeaways to implement into your daily lives.
As we age, our inflammation levels tend to increase. Researchers refer to this process as “inflammaging.” According to the article, this phenomenon is partly due to our immune systems being “less well regulated, resulting in elevated blood levels of inflammatory substances like C-reactive protein and chemokines, and allowing inflammatory agents like interleukin-6 and tumor necrosis factor-a to persist in body tissues.” In addition to the dysregulation of our immune systems, another consequence of the aging process has to do with the accumulation of senescent cells (normal cells that stop dividing). These senescent cells contribute to inflammation throughout the body, due to the fact that they "secrete substances like cytokines that induce inflammation". While researchers are hard at work to design therapies that may help with age-related inflammation increases, science has confidently concluded that lifestyle changes can drastically decrease inflammatory levels, which can make all of the difference for those looking to live their longest, healthiest lives. Keep reading for the researchers' suggestions!
Adopt a Wholesome Diet:
The New York Times article suggests that following a Mediterranean approach rich in micronutrients yields favorable outcomes when it comes to inflammation. This style of diet focuses on fresh fruits and vegetables, cold-water fish, and whole grains. For more information about the link between diet and inflammation, along with some of the foods that we recommend, head to this blog post of ours. Remember, while proper nutrition is a huge contributor to decreasing inflammatory levels, bioindividuality is also at play here. It is important to know which foods work well for your body, while also acknowledging that some foods (ie: processed foods, refined sugars, deep fried foods, etc.) should never be a part of an anti-inflammatory plan, as they are pro-inflammatory in nature, and linked to obesity, heart disease, and diabetic conditions.
Our Take: UNJUNK YOUR DIET. Try to stick with unprocessed foods when possible, shopping the perimeter of your grocery store. That way, you’re stocking up on healthy fruits and vegetables, along with high quality proteins that are known for their unbeatable nutritional properties, rather than packaged goods that are highly processed and offer little to no nutritional advantage.
Exercise Regularly:
Exercise is an excellent way to prevent inflammation--when done properly, that is. According to Dr. James Gray, the cited cardiologist and integrative medicine physician from this article, 30-45 minutes of aerobic exercise and 10-25 minutes of weight training at least 4-5 times per week is the best way to combat inflammation. While exercise may be pro-inflammatory while physically doing it, if you're ensuring adequate recovery and not over-exercising, working out is one of the best ways to reduce inflammation, decrease stress, and help you maintain a healthy weight. In fact, exercise has shown to decrease multiple inflammatory markers in the blood, which directly combats the age-related inflammation increase depicted above.
Our Take: Start slow, and build your way up to Dr. Gray's recommendations. Remember, some movement is better than no movement. In addition to an exercise routine, make sure that you are allowing yourself ample recovery time.
Avoid or Reduce Excess Weight:
Carrying excess weight increases the body's inflammatory burden, thereby making you more susceptible to a myriad of chronic health conditions. By maintaining a healthy body weight, you are actively preventing the onset of diseases that are linked to obesity. When looking to lose weight, start small, and know that even the seemingly tiny changes add up over time.
Our Take: Begin with just one habit change. If you try to change too much too soon, your habits are less likely to stick, and you are more likely to become resentful of said changes. Pick one thing that will positively impact multiple parts of your life, and commit wholeheartedly to it. For example, start each day with a 20 minute walk. This will not only give you good cardiovascular exercise, but it will also help balance circadian rhythms and decrease cortisol levels!
Get Adequate, Good Quality Sleep:
Sleep impacts every single aspect of our lives. Not only do our brains actually detox while we are asleep (crazy, huh?), but getting adequate sleep actually contributes to lower levels of stress and inflammation. So much so, that many diseases have actually been linked to chronic sleep deprivation. If you need help with your sleep hygiene, head to this blog post that we wrote a while back, which emphasizes the optimization of your sleeping environment.
Our Take: Sleep troubles can impact just about everyone. We recommend the following tips to ensure your best night of sleep.
Keep your room cool, dark, and quiet.
Use your bed for sleep and only sleep. Don’t eat, study, or work from your bed.
Track your sleep with health trackers or apps on your phone.
Take a hot bath before bed.
Journal before sleeping.
Avoid blue light exposure after the sun goes down.
Stick to a schedule.
Minimize Stress Levels:
In today’s fast-paced society, spreading ourselves too thin is a pretty common occurrence. We overcommit, our workloads are seemingly never-ending, and we rarely get the doctor-recommended amount of sleep. All of these factors cause us to hold onto excess stress, and overtime, this stress can be detrimental to our health. From the cardiovascular system to the musculoskeletal system, stress can impact every single part of the human body, making it absolutely imperative to be mindful of the number of external stressors that are present in our lives.
Our Take: Find something that you really love to do that alleviates stress. This can vary from person to person, but many find that exercise, meditation, journalling, or talking through stressful events to be beneficial in reducing stress levels.
Take Home Points
In some cases, inflammation can be a normal bodily process that bears no negative impact on our health. However, chronic inflammation, or an ongoing, constant source of inflammation, undermines the functioning of virtually all of the body's systems. As we age, our bodies experience an increase in chronic inflammation (inflammaging), which when left untreated, can lead to age-related ailments and diseases. Luckily, researchers have found many ways to tangibly counter, or possibly even reverse, age-related inflammation altogether, making the phrase "aging in reverse" a plausible reality for many of us!
As you may know, at Cryo Recovery, targeting inflammation is our number one goal to help you feel, think, and perform optimally. Over the next month, we will be diving even deeper into the field of longevity, especially as it pertains to inflammation. There are so many things that we can do to halt the aging process, in order to live our best, most fulfilling lives. It is incredibly important to us that our members are educated on these topics, as we know that this knowledge can be life-changing. Stay tuned for more in 2020!