CALORIE RESTRICTED DIETS FOR LONGEVITY

The journal, Science, recently featured a fascinating study that has huge implications for anti-ageing and longevity medicine. The report said that rhesus monkeys who were fed a calorie-restricted diet for 20 years were two-thirds less likely to die of an age-related disease than counterparts fed on a standard diet. The risk of dying from heart disease, cancer or diabetes fell by more than two-thirds in the calorie-restricted group.

The 76 animal subjects ate 30% fewer calories. Researchers noted, “The rates of cardiovascular disease and pre-cancerous cell growth were twice as high in the control group compared with the calorie restricted group.” Furthermore, none of the calorie restricted (CR) animals became diabetic or even pre-diabetic. Brain scans were also significant and showed that the CR animals demonstrated less atrophy.

The researchers also remarked that the CR monkeys “appear to be biologically younger than the normally fed animals.’ This latest study adds to the pool of data that has been accumulating for decades supporting the low-calorie intake theory of nutrition. Going back to the 70’s, Professor Roy Walford, a researcher from UCLA, studied this theory. He was his own best subject as one of the original Biosphere scientists who lived for two years in the man-made, sealed ecological dome in the Arizona desert. Walford followed a significantly calorie-restricted diet for most of his adult life.

I remember meeting Dr. Walford in 1985 when I was working as a staff physician at the Pritikin Longevity Center in Santa Monica. We were teaching the low fat diet at that time. His approach was even more intense. Walford not only limited the percentage of fat in the diet, but the total calorie intake as well. At Pritikin, the diet we taught reflected similar calorie ranges, and was quite successful in promoting weight loss, blood pressure reduction, and reducing the need for diabetic medications. The major criticism of the diet was that it was difficult to stay on for extended periods of time.

The diet program that I teach now is similar in principle to the CR diet and is called “The Paleo Diet”. I encourage people to follow a regime that is similar to what we understand was practiced in Paleolithic times. I believe this approach works best of all for avoiding age-related diseases because we were genetically designed in that bygone era, and our success as a species was dependent on the kind of food that was available at that time.

It is highly unlikely that people during the Paleolithic period ate more than 1200 to 1800 calories per day—which is the equivalent level of the CR diet. Typical Western diets are 3000 calories per day or even more. It seems logical that lowered caloric intake would dramatically reduce the risk of age-related diseases. One of the simplest ways to accomplish this is to just cut out all man-made, dense starchy carbohydrate foods such as bread, pasta, cereal, and grains. The Paleo Diet ends up looking a lot like a CR diet as long as the target food groups are not over consumed.

A comparison of the incidence of obesity that exists today with what might have existed in Paleolithic times provides food for thought. It is safe to say that obesity simply did not exist in ancient times, and by contrast with today’s diets, is a very good indicator of how much we were originally designed to consume. Just imagine the difference between the volume of food available in today’s local supermarket as compared to what was on the Paleolithic menu. The greatest challenge for early humans had nothing to do with choice—it had everything to do with securing enough food for survival.

One of humanity’s greatest accomplishments has been the ability to produce large amounts of food to assure propagation of the species. But, this achievement has a downside and not only has been detrimental to our health and longevity, but to the environment and survival of other species. As we start out to correct our own eating problems, we must first discipline ourselves to avoid the modern tendency to overindulgence, overproduction, and overconsumption. Our well-being as an evolving species and the health of our increasingly fragile planet are both at stake.

(Thanks to Geico for the Cavemen Dining image)

HOW OVERCOMING RESISTANCE HOLDS THE KEY TO WEIGHT LOSS

I had a great conversation last night with Jon Gabriel. He was my guest on my BlogTalkRadio show. Jon is the author of a new book called The Gabriel Method. It’s about a “non- diet”, diet program. Jon once weighed over 400 pounds. He is 6’2” and now weighs 185. Many people emailed me wanting to know how he lost over 200 lbs.—all without dieting. And Jon is more than willing to talk about it.

He’d been working on Wall Street in New York City and was under a tremendous amount of stress. He was supposed to travel on September 11 on Flight 93, which was the plane that crashed into the field in Pennsylvania. This near fatal experience had a profound effect on his life and he credits it with the epiphany he had about his weight.

Suddenly, Jon had the realization that he wasn’t a “fat person” and recognized that was a thin person in a fat body. When he realized this, he knew that he could lose weight without dieting because he had “reset” his belief systems. After his epiphany, everything became a lot easier for him. He knew exactly what was preventing him from losing weight and was totally clear on what he needed to do to get rid of the extra weight. The stronger his beliefs and understanding of his own, personal truth became, the faster the weight came off.

Anyone who struggles with weight loss experiences some form of resistance. The precise form it takes will vary from person to person. The ability to explore and understand one’s source of the resistance is the key to unlocking the door to weight loss. Jon’s book explores this concept in depth as well as its relationship to the power of the mind-body connection.

Maintaining high body fat is a primitive response to stress, which has been programmed in all of us since Paleolithic times, but we live in modern society. Everything we experience on a physical or emotional level will cause our “primitive” bodies to react exactly as they were programmed some 75,000 years ago. So, maintaining high body fat originally evolved as a means of protection against the cold or of some kind of bodily injury. But, this archaic message to our bodies motivates us to store extra calories. It makes perfect sense, therefore, that once the body has the protection signal removed, it will allow weight to be shed. The key here is to discover the “trigger” that informs the pituitary gland in our brain of impending danger.

If we can send the brain such a signal, then it follows that we can also send the brain a message that in order to survive, we need to be slim, fit, and agile. Obviously, this is a very different signal to the brain and one of the best ways to deliver it is by the type of exercise we do. If we are just walking for exercise at a leisurely pace, the body does not receive the reinforcement of a need to be slim and fit. One can be quite obese and be capable of walking.

However, if we do burst training where brief intense periods of high intensity exercise are performed repetitively, the body will get the message that slim and lithe suits us better for survival. This kind of exercise is what our primitive brains might perceive of as the same reflex we once occasionally used to out run a predator. Understanding how our primitive brains and genetic ancestry works is critical for weight loss and optimal health.

The hour interview with Jon flew by in what seemed like just a few minutes. I thoroughly enjoyed talking to him. He is a passionate and engaging man, who has gone far beneath the surface of weight loss resistance to find a truth that we can all share and put to great use!