Grace’s Blog

Keeping your heart healthy and strong can lower your risk for heart disease.  It is not that difficult if you follow some guidelines.

Losing weight is one.  Two thirds of Americans are overweight or obese.  Could losing weight really help the heart?  The answer is YES!

According to a recent study published in the American Journal of Physiology you can improve the way your heart functions by just losing 12% of your weight, either by diet and exercise or both.

You can have a more youthful heart by dropping some of those excess pounds if you are overweight.

As we age the arteries and heart muscles stiffen and the heart doesn’t relax like it did when we were younger.

The study showed that by losing weight, the participants gained the ability of the heart to relax more quickly, recovering some of the elasticity characteristics of a younger heart.

The heart actually became younger!

Besides exercising and losing weight, here are some other things you can do to have a healthier heart.

Eat more fiber.  A study done by Harvard University, showed that men who ate at least 25 grams of fiber a day had one-third less heart attacks then men eating 12 grams or less a day.

Eat beans.  They contain a lot of good fiber that helps prevent heart disease by lowering cholesterol.  Eating a cup of beans a day can lower cholesterol by 10- 20 percent.

Eating garlic can lower cholesterol and help decrease the risk of heart disease.

A Harvard report found that women eating 1 ounce of almonds daily had a 40 percent lower risk of fatal heart disease. 

Almonds contain vitamin E and research at England’s Cambridge University found that by taking 400 IU of vitamin E for 18 months slashed nonfatal heart attacks in cardiovascular patients by 77 percent.

Vitamin C keeps blood vessels dilated. Without vitamin C, blood vessels constrict, shutting down blood flow. 

Two thousand mg’s a day dramatically restored dilation of blood vessels in heart attack patients, a Boston University study found.

Low levels of B vitamins, especially folic acid, are a heart disease precursor. 

Make sure to get plenty in your diet.  B’s are fragile and are easily destroyed by heat. 

When supplementing, use a high quality B-Vitamin supplement containing at least 100% DV of all 8 B’s.

Eat fish, lots of fish. If eating fish is not your thing, supplement with a high quality Omega-3 supplement. 

Omega-3’s thin the blood, decrease clot formation, raise HDL cholesterol and control irregular heart beats.

Every cell in the body needs Coenzyme Q10 for energy.  A healthy heart needs lots of it.  If a person is on a cholesterol lowering drug, it could deplete this important enzyme. 

Of adults age 40 and older, as many as 42% could be classified as being at an increased risk for heart disease. 

One in every four men die of heart disease and stroke, and one of every 2.5 women die of heart disease and stroke.

Maintaining a healthy heart is critically important.

 Shaklee Independent Distributor

Happy 2010 New Year!  It’s time for the annual making of resolutions.  What will yours be?

One resolution many make in the New Year is to lose weight.  Is that you?  If it is, you have lots of company and lots of choices.

Those choices may not always be the best.

There are books about magic formulas, low fat, high fat, low carbohydrate, high protein. 

There are magic foods…grapefruit, cabbage soup, berries and chocolate.

I’ve tried a variety in my lifetime.

Cabbage soup….not my favorite.

The worst diet I tried was over 30 years ago.  I see it is still around.  My friend and I decided to do it together.  It was guaranteed to help us lose 10 pounds in 10 days.  This is the diet: Lemon juice, pure maple syrup mixed together and a cayenne pepper capsule.

Whenever I got hungry, this is all I would consume.

I lasted the entire 10 days without cheating.  On the 10^th day, I up-chucked, and it burnt all the way up.  I felt cheated because I only lost 5 pounds and for the next 2 months, my friend and I both caught every “bug” that flew by.  Not a pleasant experience.  It’s still a “Yuck” in my book.

Diets come with hype and lots of scientific sounding mumbo jumbo to show they work.  Despite what you read or hear, losing weight is solely based on the difference between calories in and calories out.

There is no “magic formula”, no “magic diet” and no “magic diet food.”  There are helps though.  Remember calories rule!

Calories in, calories out. 

The diet doesn’t have to be weird to work.

The diet should be healthy in the long run, not just for the diet’s duration.

Remember to exercise.  It increases lean muscle mass which in turn burns more calories.

Don’t start if you’re not going to finish.  It has to become a way of life, otherwise, you go back to your same old habits that got you where you are in the first place.

How did you do over the holidays?  The average weight gain is about 5 pounds.

This year I decided to do something different.  I drank a CINCH SHAKE twice a day as much as possible.  CINCH is a great meal replacement and the best breakfast on the planet.  I also took 3 in 1 BOOST to keep my metabolism going.

To my surprise and delight, I did not gain anything and even lost a bit. 

When making this year’s resolutions, change your life not just your weight.

 Shaklee Distributor