The Simple Six – by Clinton Dobbins
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
We at 10almonds don’t believe in keeping things a mystery, so…
“The Simple Six” are:
- the squat
- the goblet squat
- the hinge
- the kettlebell swing
- the push
- the push-up
- the kettle-bell press
- the pull
- the chin-up
- the gait, and
- walking.
Ok, we’re being a little glib here because to be fair, those are chunked into six groups, but the point is: don’t let the title fool you into thinking the book could have been an article; there’s plenty of valuable content here.
That said, it is a short book (64 pages), but with an average of 10 pages per exercise type, it’s a lot more than for example we could ever put into our newsletter.
Bottom line: we know that 10almonds readers like simple, clear, evidence-based, to-the-point health information, and that’s what this book is, so we do recommend it.
Click here to check out The Simple Six, and streamline your workouts!
Don’t Forget…
Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!
Learn to Age Gracefully
Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:
-
Reverse Stroke Damage (Within A 6-Hour Window)
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
❝Each year in the US, over half a million people have a first stroke; however, up to 80% of strokes may be preventable.❞
~ American Stroke Association
Source: New guideline: Preventing a first stroke may be possible with screening, lifestyle changes
If you’re reading this and thinking that it happens to other people, older people perhaps… There is a first time for everything, and most people are caught off guard by their first stroke.
Which means our health plan in this regard needs to be in two parts:
- let’s try to not have a stroke in the first place (which involves not assuming we are invulnerable right now)
- let’s try to minimize any damage done, and hasten recovery, if stroke strikes.
With regard to the first part, we’ve written about that before, including: Don’t Get Caught Out By These “Nontraditional” Stroke Risk Factors
And our most comprehensive article on the topic of stroke avoidance: Reduce Your Stroke Risk
To be truly well-prepared, you can also bear in mind: 6 Signs Of Stroke (One Month In Advance)
But what if stroke strikes?
Firstly, know this:
What To Do If Having A Stroke Alone? ← with the caveat that, if you have a stroke, there’s a good chance you’ll forget all this. However, this is good to know anyway, in case someone else is having a stroke (and if you don’t live alone, it can be good for whoever is with you to know this too).
And now there’s a new recourse: a Japanese team of researchers (Dr. Masanori Itakura et al.) have developed a drug that (per preliminary testing*, in any case) prevents the usual kind of harm done by stroke, if administered up to 6 hours after the stroke in question.
*So far, it’s completed the animal testing stage. Next is human models, and then actual humans.
How does it work, you ask?
In human blood there’s a protein (an enzyme, in fact) called glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase (GAPDH), and it has a lot of important jobs to do, including DNA repair, tRNA export, transcription membrane trafficking, heme metabolism, regulation of kinases, as well as cellular apoptosis and necrosis—which latter may sound bad, but individual cell death is an important part of the overall organism’s ongoing life. And by “the overall organism”, we mean you.
However, in stroke, this causes problems when this protein aggregates (clumps together), and starts killing everything it touches. You can probably imagine how that’s a bad thing to have happening inside your brain.
To combat this, the researchers developed a peptide to inhibit the aggregation of GAPDH, and gave this the catchy name of GAPDH aggregation inhibitor peptide-17, or GAI-17 to its friends.
In mice, GAI-17 significantly mitigated brain cell death and paralysis even when given up to six hours* after a stroke. The drug showed no significant side effects, including no harm to the heart or blood vessels.
*It was tested at 3, 6, and 9 hours. In the first two cases (at 3hrs and 6hrs) it was very effective; in the latter case (at 9 hours), it performed only marginally better than control.
You can see the paper itself, and graphs of the results, here: Inhibition of GAPDH aggregation as a potential treatment for acute ischemic stroke
And a pop-science article with some additional speculation, here: Six-hour ‘undo’ button: GAI-17 rewinds stroke damage and may beat Alzheimer’s
Want to learn more?
Here’s a good way to get started, by asking the right questions:
12 Questions For Better Brain Health
Take care!
Share This Post
-
The Bare-Bones Truth About Osteoporosis
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
In yesterday’s issue of 10almonds, we asked you “at what age do you think it’s important to start worrying about osteoporosis?”, and here’s the spread of answers you gave us:
The Bare-bones Truth About Osteoporosis
In yesterday’s issue of 10almonds, we asked you “at what age do you think it’s important to start worrying about osteoporosis?”, and here’s the spread of answers you gave us:
At first glance it may seem shocking that a majority of respondents to a poll in a health-focused newsletter think it’ll never be an issue worth worrying about, but in fact this is partly a statistical quirk, because the vote of the strongest “early prevention” crowd was divided between “as a child” and “as a young adult”.
This poll also gave you the option to add a comment with your vote. Many subscribers chose to do so, explaining your choices… But, interestingly, not one single person who voted for “never” had any additional thoughts to add.
We loved reading your replies, by the way, and wish we had room to include them here, because they were very interesting and thought-provoking.
Let’s get to the myths and facts:
Top myth: “you will never need to worry about it; drink a glass of milk and you’ll be fine!”
The body is constantly repairing itself. Its ability to do that declines with age. Until about 35 on average, we can replace bone mineral as quickly as it is lost. After that, we lose it by up to 1% per year, and that rate climbs after 50, and climbs even more steeply for those who go through (untreated) menopause.
Losing 1% per year might not seem like a lot, but if you want to live to 100, there are some unfortunate implications!
About that menopause, by the way… Because declining estrogen levels late in life contribute significantly to osteoporosis, hormone replacement therapy (HRT) may be of value to many for the sake of bone health, never mind the more obvious and commonly-sought benefits.
On the topic of that glass of milk…
- Milk is a great source of calcium, which is useless to the body if you don’t also have good levels of vitamin D and magnesium.
- People’s vitamin D levels tend to directly correlate to the level of sun where they live, if supplementation isn’t undertaken.
- Plant-based milks are usually fortified with vitamin D (and calcium), by the way.
- Most people are deficient in magnesium, because green leafy things don’t form as big a part of most people’s diets as they should.
See also: An update on magnesium and bone health
Next most common myth: “bone health is all about calcium”
We spoke a little above about the importance of vitamin D and magnesium for being able to properly use that. But potassium is also critical:
Read more: The effects of potassium on bone health
While we’re on the topic…
People think of collagen as being for skin health. And it is important for that, but collagen’s benefits (and the negative effects of its absence) go much deeper, to include bone health. We’ve written about this before, so rather than take more space today, we’ll just drop the link:
We Are Such Stuff As Fish Are Made Of
Want to really maximize your bone health?
You might want to check out this well-sourced LiveStrong article:
Bone Health: Best and Worst Foods
(Teaser: leafy greens are in 2nd place, topped by sardines at #1—where do you think milk ranks?)
Share This Post
-
5 Surprising Benefits Of Exercise After 50 (More Than Just Fitness)
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
It’s easy to want to do less as we get older, but the benefits of continuing to actively exercise, pushing oneself even just a little, can be far-reaching.
Direct and indirect benefits
As well as the obvious fitness benefits, keeping up good levels of exercise can also offer:
Healthy Skin
Exercise improves circulation, bringing growth factors (thus: regeneration, because it’s replacing cells), oxygen, and nutrients to the skin. Accordingly, it can lead to healthier, more youthful-looking skin as a low-cost alternative to a lot of skincare products. That said, it also encourages good skin habits, like daily sunscreen use.
Bone Health
Weight-bearing and resistance exercises (which between them, encompasses most forms of exercise) improve bone density. This is because physical stress signals bones to strengthen, reducing the risk of fractures. This includes activities like walking, hiking, and using resistance bands or weights. Note however that it is on a “per bone” basis. So for example, hiking will improve your lower body and spine, but do nothing for your arms. On the other hand, doing a daily groceries trip on foot, if local geography makes that practicable, can do the whole body, if one is then carrying groceries home (this writer lives about 2 miles from where she buys groceries, and does this pretty much daily).
Mental Health
Exercise, especially outdoors, has well-established positive effects on mental well-being, and can relieve stress and improve mood. As a bonus, community engagement and shared experiences can enhance mental health benefits for many people—but if you prefer it as peaceful time for yourself, that’s beneficial in its own way too!
Better Sleep
Physical activity helps promote better sleep quality, which is important for so many aspects of health—because fatiguing the body through exercise can lead to a more restful night, which is often harder to achieve with age.
Visibility and Confidence
Staying active and taking on challenges (e.g. training for some event) can boost visibility in social and family settings, countering “invisibility” often felt from midlife onwards. And even if one doesn’t do those things, exercise fosters confidence and helps people carry themselves with more self-assurance, which has a lot of knock-on benefits too.
For more on all of these things, enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like to read:
Are There Any Sensible Age Limits To Exercise?
Take care!
Share This Post
Related Posts
-
Cottage Cheese vs Ricotta – Which is Healthier?
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
Our Verdict
When comparing cottage cheese to ricotta, we picked the ricotta.
Why?
Cottage cheese is a famous health food, mostly for being a low-fat, low-carb, source of protein. And yet, ricotta beats it in most respects.
Looking at the macros first, cottage cheese has more carbs, while ricotta has more protein and fat. The fat profile is pretty much the same, and in both cases it’s two thirds saturated fat, which isn’t good in either case, but cottage cheese has less overall fat which means less saturated fat in total even if the percentage is the same. Because the difference in carbs and protein is not large, while ricotta has considerably more fat, we’ll call this category a win for cottage cheese.
In terms of vitamins, cottage cheese has more of vitamins B1, B5, and B12, while ricotta has more of vitamins A, B2, B3, B9, D, E, and K, so this one’s a win for ricotta.
In the category of minerals, cottage cheese has slightly more copper, while ricotta has much more calcium, iron, magnesium, manganese, potassium, selenium, and zinc. In particular, 2.5x more calcium, and 5x more iron! An easy and clear win for ricotta here.
Taking everything into account: yes, cottage cheese has less fat (and thus, in total, less saturated fat, although the percentage is the same), but that doesn’t make up for ricotta winning in pretty much every other respect. Still, enjoy either or both (in moderation!) if you be so inclined.
Want to learn more?
You might like to read:
Take care!
Don’t Forget…
Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!
Learn to Age Gracefully
Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:
-
Anticancer: A New Way Of Life – by Dr. David Servan-Schreiber
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
A cancer survivor himself, Dr. Servan-Schreiber found himself unimpressed with the advice he was given upon diagnosis, and set out to find better. This, he achieved.
He first provides an introductory overview of cancer, and then devotes most of the book to detailing how to create a “terrain” (the environment of your body and all that you do with/to it) that is hostile to cancer.
This includes things like diet, of course, but also exercise (the right way!), mindset, and much more. He doesn’t cover much about standard medical treatments, as he assumes the reader will already be advised about those by their oncologist, and in any case, such treatments are constantly changing as new discoveries are made. It’s worth mentioning that while he advocates strongly for complementary medicine, he does also make clear it should be just that—complementary—and not a replacement for regular treatments in cases where such are recommended.
The style is comprehensible pop-science, written for the lay reader, and yet with copious scientific references—more than 30 pages thereof. But as well as that, it’s a personal account, often revisiting his own cancer journey to illustrate one point or another, be it something that went well for him or badly, there’s always something to learn.
Bottom line: this book is important for anyone facing cancer, and useful for anyone who simply would like to improve their odds in a more informed fashion. As he notes, “all of us have cancer cells in our bodies, but not all of us will develop cancer”, and it’s good to try to be on the healthiest side of that.
Click here to check out Anticancer, and live an anticancer life!
Don’t Forget…
Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!
Learn to Age Gracefully
Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:
-
Autogenic Drainage Technique (Step-By-Step Guide To Clear Mucus From Airways)
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
One to know about, ready for allergy season usually starting next month!
Clearing things up
Autogenic drainage is an airway clearance breathing technique designed to loosen and move mucus so you can clear it more effectively.
Step by step:
- Preparation: moisten your throat with warm water, blow your nose, and sit upright to set up effective breathing.
- Body position: place your hands on your chest and upper abdomen and breathe so your upper abdomen rises and falls, showing you’re using your diaphragm.
- Humidification phase: breathe in normally, then breathe out slowly and fully while resisting the urge to cough, ideally breathing in through your nose to humidify the air.
- Low-volume breaths: after breathing out fully, take small breaths in followed by full breaths out to help loosen secretions.
- A rattling sound in your lungs means mucus is loosening and moving.
- Keep on going: move to larger mid-range breaths in with controlled breaths out, then finish with full breaths in followed by controlled breaths out.
- Finishing up: once secretions have moved, clear them with a cough or preferably a huff cough.
For more on all of this plus visual illustrations, enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like:
What Your Mucus Says About Your Health
Take care!
Don’t Forget…
Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!
Learn to Age Gracefully
Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:
