Age Later – by Dr. Nir Barzilai
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Dr. Barzilai discusses why we age, why supercentenarians age more slowly, and even, why it is so often the case that supercentenarians outside of Blue Zones have poor lifestyles (their longevity is because of protective genes that mitigate the harmful effects of those poor lifestyles—the ultimate in “survivorship bias”).
He also talks not just genetics, but also epigenetics, and thus gene expression. Bearing in mind, there’s a scale of modifiability there: with current tech, we can’t easily change a bad gene… But we often can just switch it off (or at least downregulate its expression). This is where studies in supercentenarians are helpful even for those who don’t have such fortunate genes—the supercentenarian studies show us which genes we want on or off, what gene expressions to aim for, etc. Further clinical studies can then show us what lifestyle interventions (exercise, diet, nutraceuticals, etc) can do that for us.
With regard to those lifestyle interventions, he does cover many, and that’s where a lot of the practical value of the book comes from. But it’s not just “do this, do that”; understanding the reasons behind why things work the way they do is important, so as to be more likely to do it right, and also to enjoy greater adherence (we tend to do things we understand more readily than things we have just been told to do).
There are areas definitely within the author’s blind spots—for example, when talking about menopausal HRT, he discusses at great length the results of the discredited WHI study, and considers it the only study of relevance. So, this is a reminder to not believe everything said by someone who sounds confident (Dr. Barzilai’s professional background is mostly in treating diabetes).
In terms of style, it is very much narrative; somewhat pop-science, but more “this doctor wants to tell stories”. So many stories. Now, the stories all have informational value, so this isn’t padding, but it is the style, so we mention it as such. As for citations, there aren’t any, so if you want to look up the science he mentions, you’re going to need a bit of digital sleuthery to find the papers from the clues in the stories.
Bottom line: if you’re interested in the science of aging and how that has been progressing for the past decades and where we’re at, this book will give you so many jumping-off points, and is an engaging read.
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Modern Friendship – by Anna Goldfarb
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It’s a topic we’ve covered before at 10almonds: Human Connection In An All-Too-Busy World.
Here, however, Goldfarb has an entire book to cover what we had one article to cover, so of course it’s a lot more in-depth.
Importantly, if also covers: what if you seem to be doing everything right, and it’s still not working out? What if you’re already reaching out, suggesting things, doing your part?
Piece by piece, she uncovers what the very many problems are, ranging from availability issues and priorities, to health concerns and financial difficulties, to challenges as diverse as trust issues and exhaustion, and much more.
After all the hard truths about modern friendship, she gets onto equally cheery topics such as why friendships fail, but fear not, solutions are forthcoming too—and indeed, that’s what most of the book is about.
Covering such topics as desire, diligence, and delight, we learn how to not only practise wholehearted friendship, but also, how to matter to others, too. She finishes up with a “14-day friendship cleanse”, which sounds a lot more alarming than it actually is.
The style is interesting, being personal and, well, friendly throughout—but still with scholarly citations as we go along, and actual social science rather than mere conjecture.
Bottom line: if you find that your friendships are facing challenges, this book can help you to get to the bottom of any problems and move forwards (likely doing so together).
Click here to check out Modern Friendship, and learn how to truly nurture and grow your connections!
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Fat’s Real Barriers To Health
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Fat Justice In Healthcare
This is Aubrey Gordon, an author, podcaster, and fat justice activist. What does that mean?
When it comes to healthcare, we previously covered some ideas very similar to her work, such as how…
There’s a lot of discrimination in healthcare settings
In this case, it often happens that a thin person goes in with a medical problem and gets treated for that, while a fat person can go in with the same medical problem and be told “you should try losing some weight”.
Top tip if this happens to you… Ask: “what would you advise/prescribe to a thin person with my same symptoms?”
Other things may be more systemic, for example:
When a thin person goes to get their blood pressure taken, and that goes smoothly, while a fat person goes to get their blood pressure taken, and there’s not a blood pressure cuff to fit them, is the problem the size of the person or the size of the cuff? It all depends on perspective, in a world built around thin people.
That’s a trivial-seeming example, but the same principle has far-reaching (and harmful) implications in healthcare in general, e.g:
- Surgeons being untrained (and/or unwilling) to operate on fat people
- Getting a one-size-fits-all dose that was calculated using average weight, and now doesn’t work
- MRI machines are famously claustrophobia-inducing for thin people; now try not fitting in it in the first place
…and so forth. So oftentimes, obesity will be correlated with a poor healthcare outcome, where the problem is not actually the obesity itself, but rather the system having been set up with thin people in mind.
It would be like saying “Having O- blood type results in higher risks when receiving blood transfusions”, while omitting to add “…because we didn’t stock O- blood”.
Read more on this topic: Shedding Some Obesity Myths
Does she have practical advice about this?
If she could have you understand one thing, it would be:
You deserve better.
Or if you are not fat: your fat friends deserve better.
How this becomes useful is: do not accept being treated as the problem!
Demand better!
If you meekly accept that you “just need to lose weight” and that thus you are the problem, you take away any responsibility from your healthcare provider(s) to actually do their jobs and provide healthcare.
See also Gordon’s book, which we’ve not reviewed yet but probably will one of these days:
“You Just Need to Lose Weight”: And 19 Other Myths About Fat People – by Aubrey Gordon
Are you saying fat people don’t need to lose weight?
That’s a little like asking “would you say office workers don’t need to exercise more?”; there are implicit assumptions built into the question that are going unaddressed.
Rather: some people might benefit healthwise from losing weight, some might not.
In fact, over the age of 65, being what is nominally considered “overweight” reduces all-cause mortality risk.
For details of that and more, see: When BMI Doesn’t Measure Up
But what if I do want/need to lose weight?
Gordon’s not interested in helping with that, but we at 10almonds are, so…
Check out: Lose Weight, But Healthily
Where can I find more from Aubrey Gordon?
You might enjoy her blog:
Aubrey Gordon | Your Fat Friend
Or her other book, which we reviewed previously:
What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About Fat – by Aubrey Gordon
Enjoy!
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Calm For Surgery – by Dr Chris Bonney
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As a general rule of thumb, nobody likes having surgery. We may like the results of the surgery, we may like having the surgery done and behind us, but surgery itself is not most people’s idea of fun, and honestly, the recovery period afterwards can be a pain in every sense of the word.
Dr. Chris Bonney, an anesthesiologist, gives us the industry-secrets low-down, and is the voice of experience when it comes to the things to know about and/or prepare in advance—the little things that make a world of difference to your in-hospital experience and afterwards.
Think of it like “frequent flyer traveller tips” but for surgeries, whereupon knowing a given tip can mean the difference between deeply traumatic suffering and merely not being at your usual best. We think that’s worth it.
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10 Ways To Lower Blood Pressure Naturally
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Increasingly many people, especially over a certain age, are taking so many medications that it precipitates a train of other medications to deal with the side effects of the previous ones. This is neither fun nor healthy. Of course, sometimes it’s a necessity, but often it’s not, so if you’d like to avoid blood pressure meds, here are some good first-line things, as recommended by Dr. Siobhan Deshauer:
No-med options
Dr. Deshauer recommends:
- Diet: follow the DASH diet by eating whole foods, lean / plant-based proteins, and reducing salt and processed foods to lower blood pressure by 5–6 points.
- Sodium reduction: limit sodium intake to 2g/day, focusing on reducing processed foods, which account for 80% of sodium consumption.
- Increase potassium intake: eat potassium-rich foods (e.g. fruit, vegetables) to lower blood pressure by 5–7 points but consult a doctor if you have kidney issues or take certain medications.
- Exercise: engage in isometric exercises like wall squats or planks, which lower systolic pressure by up to 8 points; any exercise is beneficial.
- Weight loss: lose weight (specifically: fat) if (and only if!) carrying excess fat, as each 1 kg (2.2 lbs) excess adiposity reduction can decrease blood pressure by 1 point.
- Limit alcohol: avoid consuming more than two alcoholic drinks per day, as it raises blood pressure.
- Quit smoking: stop smoking to prevent increased blood pressure and long-term vessel damage caused by nicotine.
- Improve sleep: aim for at least 6 hours of sleep per night, ideally 7–9, and seek medical advice if you suspect sleep apnea.
- Manage stress: adopt healthy stress management strategies to avoid the indirect effects of stress on blood pressure.
- Adopt a pet: pet ownership, particularly dogs, can lower blood pressure more effectively than some medications.
For more on each of these, enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like to read:
Ideal Blood Pressure Numbers Explained
Take care!
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How Your Sleep Position Changes Dementia Risk
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This is not just about sleep duration or even about sleep quality… It really is about which way your body is positioned.
Goodnight, glymphatic system
The association between sleeping position and dementia risk is about glymphatic drainage, which is largely powered by gravity (and thus dependent on which way around your head and neck are oriented), and very important for clearing toxins out of the brain—including beta-amyloid proteins.
This becomes particularly important when the glymphatic system becomes less efficient in midlife, often 15–20 years before cognitive decline symptoms appear.
The video’s thumbnail headline, “SCIENTISTS REVEAL: THE WAY YOUR SLEEP CAN CAUSE DEMENTIA” is overstated and inaccurate, but our adjusted headline “how your sleep position changes dementia risk” is actually representative of the paper on which this video was based; we’ll quote from the paper itself here:
❝This paper concludes that 1. glymphatic clearance plays a major role in Alzheimer’s pathology; 2. the vast majority of waste clearance occurs during sleep; 3. dementias are associated with sleep disruption, alongside an age-related decline in AQP4 polarization; and 4. lifestyle choices such as sleep position, alcohol intake, exercise, omega-3 consumption, intermittent fasting and chronic stress all modulate* glymphatic clearance. Lifestyle choices could therefore alter Alzheimer’s disease risk through improved glymphatic clearance, and could be used as a preventative lifestyle intervention for both healthy brain ageing and Alzheimer’s disease.❞
…and specifically, they found:
❝Glymphatic transport is most efficient in the right lateral sleeping position, with more CSF clearance occurring compared to supine and prone. The average person changes sleeping position 11 times per night, but there was no difference in the number of position changes between neurodegenerative and control groups, making the percentage of time spent in supine position the risk factor, not the number of position changes❞
Read the paper in full here: The Sleeping Brain: Harnessing the Power of the Glymphatic System through Lifestyle Choices
*saying “modulate” here is not as useful as it could be, because they modulate it differently: side-sleeping improves clearance; back sleeping decreases it; front-sleeping isn’t great either. Alcohol intake reduces clearance, exercise (especially cardiovascular exercise) improves it; omega-3 consumption improves it up a degree and does depend on omega-3/6 ratios, intermittent fasting improves it, and chronic stress worsens it.
And for a more pop-science presentation, enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like to read:
How To Clean Your Brain (Glymphatic Health Primer)
Take care!
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What Your Brain Is Really Doing When You’re Doing “Nothing”
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Unless we are dead, our brain is never truly inactive. And it’s not just a matter of regulating autonomic functions, either…
Default Mode Network
When the brain is at rest but not necessarily asleep, the Default Mode Network (DMN) engages. This makes up for around 20% of the brain’s overall activity, and contributes to complex cognitive processes.
What constitutes “at rest”: the DMN activates when external tasks stop and is engaged during self-reflection, mind-wandering, and relaxed memory recall (i.e. reminiscing, rather than answering questions in a difficult test, for example).
As for its neurophysiology, the DMN is connected to the hippocampus and plays a key role in episodic, prospective, and semantic memory (memories of experiences, future plans, and general knowledge), as well as being involved in self-reflection, social cognition, and understanding others’ thoughts (theory of mind). The DMN thus also helps integrate memories and thoughts to create a cohesive internal narrative and sense of self.
However, it doesn’t work alone: the DMN interacts with other networks like the salience network, which switches attention to external stimuli. Disruptions between these networks are linked to psychiatric disorders (e.g., schizophrenia, Alzheimer’s, depression), in various different ways depending on the nature of the disruption.
Sometimes, for some people in some circumstances, the option to disrupt the DMN is useful. For example, research shows that psilocybin disrupts the DMN, leading to changes in brain activity and potential therapeutic benefits for depression* and other psychiatric disorders by enhancing neuroplasticity.
*Essentially, kicking the brain out of the idling gear it got stuck in, and into action
For more on all of this, enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like to read:
- The Wandering Mind – by Dr. Michael Corballis ← a book, largely about the DMN and how to use it beneficially
- Taking A Trip Through The Evidence On Psychedelics ← for a shorter read, touching on psilocybin
Take care!
Don’t Forget…
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Learn to Age Gracefully
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